Portrait, based on a photo, of artist friend Mike Quirke.
Oil on canvas. 12 x 16 inches.
Plants
A commission that didn’t happen. A friend asked for a painting based on a mural, which she’d fallen in love with, in Sucevita Monastery in Romania. The mural depicts the third day in Genesis when God fills the Earth with vegetation.
Photos of the Romanian mural are a tad muddy, so I thought I’d tidy it up (pictured.)
My version was perhaps too tidy. My friend didn’t like it, so I painted it over. We both agreed it wasn’t my style anyway, but it was fun to paint.
Acrylic on canvas. 24 x 24 inches.
First show – June 2019
This was the flyer for my first show.
And yes, it’s high time for another one.
‘Arrupe’
This was a sketch for a larger painting of Pedro Arrupe SJ at prayer. It’s based on a photo by Don Doll SJ.
The larger painting didn’t happen but I like how the sketch turned out. I think it’s still in the office of the parish priest at Farm Street.
Acrylic on canvas, 12 x 16 inches.
‘Due Bambini in Kimono’ (2019)
Oil on canvas, 12 x 16 inches.
The Romero Chapel at Sacred Heart Church, Edinburgh
My painting in the Romero Chapel at Sacred Heart Church, Edinburgh.
The reliquary contains Rutilio Grande’s diary and a tiny piece of Oscar Romero’s bloodstained clothing.
‘Saints of El Salvador’ (2019)
Commissioned by the Archbishop Romero Trust for the new Romero Chapel at Sacred Heart Church, Edinburgh.
Rutilio Grande SJ (grey jacket) and Óscar Romero (cassock) were gunned down by security forces in 1977 and 1980 respectively for speaking out against the repression of the Salvadoran poor. The painting is based on a photograph by Brother Octavio Duran.
Acrylic on linen, 100 x 100 cm
‘Pope Francis, mobile phones’ (2017)
Based on a press photograph by Alessandro Bianchi
Acrylic on canvas, 36 x 24 inches
I haven’t signed this off as I’m not quite sure if it’s finished. The problem has been the background. At one point I had a Buenos Aires rubbish dump behind the Pope with cartoneros (litter-pickers) busy at work, and the horizon at the back was an arc, the curvature of the earth. What I wanted was the rich, the poor, the Pope, and (referencing his encyclical Laudate si) an exploited planet, all squashed into the one canvas. Waking up one morning I realised I was overloading the picture and painted it all out. The hidden Gospel verse (Lk 6:20) is a relic from that earlier painting.
‘Toos and Max Brenninkmeijer, early 1960s’ (2018)
Acrylic on linen, 30 x 20 inches
‘Rutilio Grande and Óscar Romero’ (2018)
My painting of two 20th century martyrs from El Salvador – Rutilio Grande S.J. and Archbishop Óscar Romero – commissioned by the Archbishop Romero Trust for permanent display in St Ignatius Church, Stamford Hill.
Archbishop Romero was canonised on 14 October 2018. I understand Father Grande’s beatification is imminent.
Acrylic on linen. 48 x 36 inches. 122 x 92 cm.
peter bridgman paintings 