St. Catherine Altoid Tin Shrine - Patron Saint of Artists

St. Catherine of Bologna - Altoid Tin Shrine

Patron Saint of Artists

St. Catherine of Bologna was an Italian nun and artist born as Catherine de' Vigri on September 8, 1413 in Bologna, Italy.

She was the member of an aristocratic family and the daughter of a diplomat to the Marquis of Ferrara. Catherine received a wonderful education in reading, writing, singing and drawing while being raised at the court of the Duke of Ferrara. Catherine excelled in painting, Latin and the viola.

In 1426, at 13-years-old, she entered the convent of Corpus Domini at Ferrara and became a Franciscan Tertiary.  Catherine was openly willing to serve the more humble roles in the convent. She was a laundress, a baker and a caretaker for the animals.  In 1432, Catherine and other young women of Ferrara founded a monastery of the Order of Poor Clares (an order founded by St. Francis and St. Clare of Assisi) where she was later appointed as Superioress.  In 1456, Catherine returned to Bologna with her superiors and the governors there requested she found a second monastery of the same Order and be the Abbess of the convent.

Catherine continued to paint and to write beautiful spiritual guides and poetry. She wrote the Treatise on the 7 Spiritual Weapons Necessary for Spiritual Warfare. 

During the Lenten season of 1463, Catherine became seriously ill, and on March 9th she passed away.

She was buried without a coffin and her body was exhumed eighteen days later because of many cures attributed to her at her graveside and the sweet scent coming from her grave. Her body was discovered incorrupt (undecayed) and remains so today.  Catherine is dressed in her religious habit seated upright on a golden throne behind glass in the chapel of the Poor Clares in Bologna.  Her skin has since been blackened due to exposure from oil lamps and soot.

Saint Catherine was beatified in 1524 by Pope Clement VII and canonized on May 22, 1712 by Pope Clement XI. She is the patron saint of artists, the liberal arts, the City of Bologna, and against temptations.

Her feast day is celebrated on March 9.

My Altoid Tin Shrine - St. Catherine of Bologna

 I had a ton of fun making this shrine.  The paintbrushes surrounding the shrine are from OffCenter -- several times while volunteering at OffCenter - organizing supplies -- they allowed me to take home all the paintbrushes that had been ruined with hardened paint.  I sawed off those paintbrushes and used them to surround St. Catherine.

The little painting on the left side of the photo of the Madonna and Child is a painting that is attributed to St. Catherine.

On the right side of the shrine at the base is a small pile of miniature artist's tools which were a delight to make -- the case of Faber-Castell pastels, two tiny paintbrushes, a palette and a tube of blue paint.

Here's a view of the backside of the shrine which is covered with metal belt links and a concho.

St. Lucy Altoid Tin Shrine

Another Altoid Tin Shrine -- St. Lucy

Lucy, whose name can mean "light" or "lucid," is the patron saint of the blind and those with eye afflictions. She is often seen with a pair of human eyes on a plate or in a bowl. In paintings, she is often depicted with a golden plate which holds her eyes and she often holds a palm branch, which is a symbol of victory over evil.

Lucy's history has been lost and all we really know for certain is that this brave woman who lived in Syracuse, Italy, lost her life during the persecution of Christians in the early fourth century. Her veneration spread to Rome so that by the sixth century the whole Church recognized her courage in defense of the faith.

Because people wanted to shed light on Lucy's bravery, legends began to crop up. The one that has passed the test of time tells the story of a young Christian woman who vowed to live her life in service of Christ. Lucy's mother tried to arrange a marriage for her with a pagan man and Lucy knew her mother could not be swayed by a young girl's vow, so she devised a plan to convince her mother that Christ was the better partner for life.

After several prayers at the tomb of Saint Agatha (a highly venerated virgin saint who also had experiences similar to Lucy's), Lucy saw the saint in a dream. St. Agatha told Lucy her mother's longstanding illness would be cured through faith.  Lucy used this information to persuade her mother to give the dowry money to the poor and allow Lucy to commit her life to God.

While Lucy and her mother were grateful to God, the rejected bridegroom was deeply angered and betrayed Lucy's faith to the governor Paschasius. The governor attempted to force her into defilement at a brothel, but the guards who came to take her away were unable to move her, even after hitching her to a team of oxen.  (Go Lucy!)

The guards heaped bundles of wood around her but it wouldn't burn so they finally resorted to their swords, and Lucy met her death.

Lucy's legend did not end with her death. According to later accounts, Lucy warned Paschasius he would be punished. When the governor heard this he ordered the guards to gouge out her eyes; however, in another telling, it was Lucy who removed her own eyes in an attempt to discourage the persistent suitor who greatly admired them.

When her body was being prepared for burial, they discovered her eyes had been restored.

Accounts say that Lucy's body remained undisturbed in Sicily for 400 years until Faroald II, Duke of Spoleto, seized the island and transferred Lucy's remains to Abruzzo, Italy. It was later removed by Emperor Otho I in 972 to Metz and left in the church of St. Vincent. There is much confusion about what happened to her body after its stay at St. Vincent's, but it is believed that several pieces of her body can be found in Rome, Naples, Verona, Lisbon, Milan, Germany, France and Sweden.

My St. Lucy Altoid Tin Shrine

Since I have several issues with my eyes, I've added St. Lucy to my personal team of Saints.

On the right side of  the shrine is a little basket filled with hand-made loaves of bread.  St. Lucy was known for feeding the poor.

I found some wonderful hand-made, hand-painted ceramic eyeball beads in a local bead  store.  Here's a close-up of the eyeballs which are on the plate on the left side of the photo.  I hadn't fully researched St. Lucy at the time I adhered the plate to the shrine base, or the plate would have been golden . . .

I also used blue and white glass eye beads from Turkey around the perimeter of the shrine.

And on the upper left of the shrine is a metal milagro from Mexico -- a pair of eyes.

St. Gertrude of Nivelles -- the Patron Saint of Cats and People Who Love Them

I grew up in Southern Ohio as a white bread mainstream protestant.  For awhile my family lived next door to the Italian Catholic Sabatelli family.  I went to public grade school and the Sabetelli kids went to Catholic grade school.  I heard about Catechism and The Saints from the Sabatelli kids and I pretty much dismissed catechism as stupid and The Saints as fairy tales.

Over the years my religious beliefs changed quite a bit and I had one of what Dr. Phil refers to as "defining moments" in my life when I started studying in the Sufi Order and my teacher told me that "God didn't have to be anything that I ever thought he was."  That one sentence pretty much blew my mind and totally changed the way I viewed my own religious beliefs and the beliefs of others.  

In my adulthood, I traveled in Catholic Mexico quite a bit and lived in Puerto Vallarta for about three years where I was exposed to many more stories and beliefs about The Saints -- learning that they were indeed real people, not fairy tales, and that in order to become canonized as a saint, they had each performed at least three documented miracles.   Every town in Mexico has a Patron Saint.  Every occupation and trade has a patron saint.    Here's a quote from Wikipedia about Patron Saints:

"A Patron Saint . . . is regarded as the heavenly advocate of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, family or person. Catholics believe that patron saints, having already transcended to the metaphysical, are able to intercede effectively for the needs of their special charges."

Now that I live in New Mexico, a very Catholic State, I continue to be exposed to the culture of Patron Saints and we even have Saints who are "popular" in the Southwest,  There are many artists in New Mexico whose work consists of making southwestern style saints. -- paintings, bultos, retablos, carvings, etc.

I first encountered St. Gertrude of Nivelles (who was a 7th Century abbess) on a greeting card designed by Barbara Barrett in Papers! -- the decorative paper store where I worked and taught classes for several years.  You can see Barbara's greeting card work at thekaleidoscopedesigns.com

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I decided that my second Altoid Tin Shrine would feature St. Gertrude.  St. Gertrude  of Nivelles (there are two - the other is Gertrude the Great)  is also the patron saint of the insane and gardeners, so maybe that also explains why I was immediately drawn to her.  Ha.

This shrine is constructed in the same style as my Virgin of Guadalupe Altoid Tin Shrine -- removing the lid from the box, etc.

St. Gertrude stands in her gold glittered nicho, holding a kitty, and two (button) kitties frolic on pebbles in front of her.  I covered a royal jelly glass container with blue glitter, and the container holds the whiskers of my beloved Houdini who had some amazing whiskers that I'd find around the house.  The whiskers lived in a glass spice jar until I made this little shrine -- a perfect spot for them. 

Here is my big boy Houdini, now in Kitty Heaven, in one of his favorite spots -- right in the middle of my work table.

Back to the shrine -- add some flowers, leaves, sequins, beads, metal corners and studs -- and there you have my Altoid tin shrine #2.

Shrine #3 is a second Virgin of Guadalupe shrine which I gifted before taking photos of it.  One of these days I'll have the opportunity to photo it and add it to the blog.

Watch for Shrine #4 to be added to my blog soon -- St. Catherine of Bologna, Patron Saint of Artists.

The Virgin of Guadalupe meets an Altoid Tin and some Pencil Stubs

I had been saving pencil stubs for several years -- wanting to use them on one of my 2-D mixed media collages as the rays emanating from the Virgin of Guadalupe.

As you might guess, this becomes another story of "art takes a detour."  

Those darned pencil stubs just didn't want to lie flat on a 2-D canvas -- they wanted to express themselves in 3-D fashion.

Thus begins the saga of The Virgin of Guadalupe meeting an Altoid Tin and some pencil stubs.

I first deconstructed an Altoid tin -- removed the lid from the base, gessoed both pieces, then painted them gold.

I used one of my favorite images of the Virgin of Guadalupe in a blue robe -- 

trimmed her and Mod Podged her, and mounted her in the bottom portion of the tin into which I had glued lots of gold beads.  The sides of the shrine are embellished with beads and flat-back rhinestones.  A molded gold angel and separate gold paper foil wings are mounted in front of the Virgin.  And I gave her a Jolee's Boutique gold crown

The Altoid tin lid forms the base of the shrine -- which is embellished with gold studs and rose-shaped buttons that I painted red.  

The pencil stubs are glued to the back of the shrine and a rather nice large junk jewelry clip-style earring (with the clip removed) covers the area where the pencil stubs don't quite converge (there just isn't room for all those eraser ends).

I've already made five more Altoid tin shrines.  I'll get them photographed and added to my blog.  And there are two more in progress on my work table.  I guess I've started yet another series!