Second Breakfast

I visited Santa Fe this weekend to attend the board meeting of More Light Presbyterians, a national organization in the Presbyterian Church, (USA) that is working towards the inclusion and full acceptance of LGBT persons in the church. I arrived a bit early, and was encouraged to visit a couple of local museums, including the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum and The Awakening Museum. While the O’Keeffe museum was nice and kind of what I expected (landscape, abstracts, and flowers that the artist did not intend to look like labia but rather do), I had no idea what to expect regarding The Awakening Museum. And when I arrived, the nice woman at the reception desk told me that it was a single large installation piece by a French artist living in America. I was a bit skeptical, and she apologized for the cellist who was rehearsing in the space and offered me free admission. I paid anyways, as I love the cello and museums always need money. I was expecting a room full of pink plastic, since that’s what I associate with the phrase “French artist” for some reason. What I experienced instead was profound and a little overwhelming.

The piece consists of a set of over 400 carved and painted wood panels which cover the walls and ceiling of a space the size of a small gymnasium. They were produced by Jean-Claude Gaugy, a French artist living in the US. The work was done over a 13 year period and was part of and a response to a spiritual journey that Gaugy was experiencing. The work itself depicts a number of New Testament stories, including the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:3-12), the Last Supper (Matthew 26:26-28), the Resurrection (Luke 24), and the “four horsemen of the Apocalypse” (Revelation 6:1-8). It is both awe-inspiring and very moving, and I found myself in tears as I listened to the Bach cello suite that the beautiful young man, Timothee Marcel, was playing. This is truly an amazing work, and if you are ever in the Santa Fe area I encourage you to visit.

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