"Anno Domini" - Saint John's Abbey Church, is a painting that I did in the fall of 2016. Saint John's Abbey Church is located in Collegeville, Minnesota and is designed by famed architect Marcel Breuer. ( I encourage you to google it, as it's quite the structure!) I've always been enthralled by it and in the back of my mind I knew one day I'd try painting it. That day happened by chance as I had set out to paint something completely different. I had my mind set on attempting to paint something inspired by the painter Mark Rothko. I usually paint horizontally and I also usually only use large paint scrapers that the hardware store sells. On this day I decided once half way thru to put my painting on a vertical easel to check out what was happening. I spun it around looking at it on each of it's sides and it soon occurred to me that to my surprise I could see the Abbey in it! Apparently today was the day!
There is a lot I could say about what was behind my thoughts as I was painting it. I'm going to try and get a copy of an interview that a current St. Ben's student did for a school project where she interviewed me about the painting. Seems like that would be a fun way to share more of the story as she had offered to give me a copy. Suffice it to say, that to have it placed in the newly renovated Alcuin Library at St. John's is quite a thrill for me and my family. There is also a fantastic bench designed by Marcel Breuer that sits under it. I am so grateful for the support and belief in this painting from Saint John's and I'm so grateful to be able to share it with others who love the Abbey as much as I do. On a side note, "Anno Domini" was the first painting to leave my studio, as I had been painting less than a year when I painted it. It holds a special place in my heart and I am thrilled to sell the lithograph prints and donate the proceeds to the art department at Saint John's. The prints are now available at the SJU bookstore.
Fast forward about 8 months later and I'm now happy to announce that "Anno Domini-Winter" has been printed! It is a four color Lithograph print that was printed by the same team that did the original print. When printing the originalI I fell in love with the progressive sheets, which are the test sheets in various colors that they toss as they are testing them, thus "Winter" was discovered. It's simplicity really spoke to me and I hope it will to you too. It is also now being sold at the SJU bookstore. I've included a photograph of it below (the photo is taken on a slant, so don't let that throw you off) and also some photos of the Saint John's Abbey Church, the Alcuin Library, and some photos of the making of the original Lithograph print. It took us nine hours to print it on a Heidelburg Press and it was done by the same excellent print team that printed the Saint John's Bible. Because of the gold in my painting they knew how to work with it because of their experience working on the Bible. (Ends up gold is hard to reproduce correctly) It was a joy to work with them and it was really fun to hear all the stories of the printing of the Bible. Incredible, incredible process. What a fantastic experience. I can't say enough of what a blessing it was to work with them. I'm so extremely grateful!
Saint John's Abbey Church. Designed by Marcel Breuer.
The new entrance to the Alcuin Library. Check out the fantastic new windows!
"Anno Domini" is located in the entrance to the library and hangs over a very incredible bench designed by the architect Marcel Breuer. I have to touch the bench each time we visit, it's so lovely! A special thank you to Saint John's for taking such care in the placement and in the belief of "Anno Domini".
The interior of the library is a designers dream and a learners dream to learn in!
We did a 9 color lithograph. The original painting is used for color reference. After each pass we analyzed what the colors were doing and if we were on the right path. Let's just say, these guys are good....like, really, really good at what they are doing! They are as much of an artist as I am, if not more! They took such care of my project and were so invested in having it turn out excellent. It's magical to work with such skilled artisans. Thank you guys!
I could not have done this without the excellent help of Mike! He guided us through the whole process from start to finish. He also worked on the Saint John's Bible and is such a pro. He was also instrumental in getting "Anno Domini" - Winter into existence. Thank you Mike! I hope we get to work together again some day!
The Heidelberg Press we printed on. Super fun to learn so much! And the name kind of has a ring to it lol ;-)
The excellent team that worked so hard on "Anno Domini" along with Dan and myself. A huge thank you to them!
These are the progressive sheets, known as "progs". Many many color runs were done to test out the colors and they would just recycle the sheets, but oh how I fell in LOVE with them! In that pile somewhere is "Anno Domini" - Winter!!
The press was just so cool....
The final product! It took nine hours but we did it!! Again, thank you to the printing team! And thank you to all the people who have believed in this painting! Cheers!!!
The final product!
The best part is giving it away as gifts!! Cheers to these students for all the hard work they did in the Mayo Scholar program!!