HOLINESS IN ART

One of our favorite nuns, a TV personality, died at the Carmelite Monastery in Quidenham in Norfolk right after Christmas, at the grand age of 88. All in our Community were avid fans of her programsi n the early 1990s on great art. 

This little known religious soared to international fame presenting her series of popular and unscripted art programs for the BBC.  Her popular shows included Sister Wendy's Odyssey (1992) and Sister Wendy's Grand Tour (1994).

SISTER WENDY BECKETT was born in South Africa in 1930, she was still a child when her family moved to Edinburgh, where her father studied medicine. She joined the Sisters of Notre Dame at the age of 16  and was sent to Oxford University in 1950, where she was awarded a Congratulatory First Class degree in English literature, before a stint teaching in South Africa. But persistent heart trouble and a history of epilepsy drained her strength. Health problems combined with the dream of a contemplative life, which she had abandoned when she entered her order of teaching nuns, brought her back to England.

In the early 1970s, she was released from her vows as a Sister of Notre Dame and changed her religious status to “consecrated virgin,” with the blessing of the Vatican. From then on, she was not a member of any religious order, yet still wore a homemade black habit, a variation on the one she wore as a Sister of Notre Dame.  Carmelites in Norfolk  offered her a home on their property and took care of her for the rest of her life. They delivered her meals to the unheated blue trailer and in return  she contributed most of her income to the convent.

Sister Wendy began studying fine art in the 1980s and began her art career as a magazine critic, reviewing exhibitions for small British art journals. She decided to write a book to raise money for the convent. Contemporary Women Artists, published in 1988, was the first of many books and articles.

Sister Wendy became well-loved for her unusual presenting style, which saw her discuss featured paintings in depth and without an auto-cue. She was not a physically striking figure with her almost buck teeth and her tendency to pronounce “r” as if it were “w”, yet she won the hearts of all who watched her with her keen wit and insight on the art she presented. 

"Art is beauty and God is beauty. If you can get people to look at art; you are bringing them closer to Him, even if they don't know His name."

"My own definition of beauty is that which perpetually satisfies us. You look at it again and again and there is more of it to satisfy us. I would say that beauty is very much an attribute of God - He is essential beauty. But only those of us who have been fortunate enough to have faith know where beauty comes from. For the others, they are responding to beauty and responding to Him, though they mightn't be aware of that - they are responding to the pure, free, strong, loving spirit of God."

My favorite of all the books she wrote, did not deal with art, but rather her spiritual letters to the many  who sought her wisdom.  In the preface she has written a charming and very personal short autobiography, setting  the  letters in their context. 

As she joins the Lord in a better place, she has left us much food for thought.