MAXO (Maximilian)
VANKA
was born in 1889 in Croatia, the illegitimate son
of Austrian
nobility. He spent his first eight years working as part of a peasant family.
When his maternal grandmother discovered his existence, she gave him an aristocratic
life living in a castle and his education included art.
He studied
at the art academy in Zagreb and then the
Academie Royale des Beaux Arts in Brussels.
As a 25-year-old student, he won the gold medal of King Albert. He continued to
exhibit throughout Europe, winning many
honors. He taught art in Zagreb.
He served with the Belgian Red Cross, because he was a pacifist and would
not serve in the regular army.
Though he found success in Croatia,
the growing threat to his Jewish family fueled his immigration to America in
1934. He won the
heart of the daughter of an American doctor, Margaret Stetten. Thanks to a Father Zagar, he arrived in Millvale PA in 1937
He is known
for the Vanka Murals at St. Nicholas Church, a small Croatian Catholic Church in
Millvale, set atop the hillside across the Allegheny River from the bustling
city of Pittsburgh. This was the first Croatian
Catholic parish in the United
States.
(Our area has many Croatian families and we are close to several
Croatian priests).
Father Albert
Zagar, the parish priest, longed for color on his church’s plain walls and specifically “not average Church murals”–
so, he invited Maxo Vanka to come and paint inside the small Romanesque church,
which had recently been rebuilt after a destructive fire.
Maxo accepted
and came to Millvale, collaborating with the priest to create one of the most
spectacular collections of murals in the world. The artist painted a portion of
the murals in 1937 and, in 1941, returned to the church to paint the remainder
of the scenes.
The murals
depict Christ and Mary in images of war and offer social commentary on world
events like fascism, war and poverty. They depict
Croatian immigrants coming to America
to seek a better life, grateful to have escaped the slaughter taking place in
their homeland.
This was Maxo’s "Mothers offer up their sons for
labor" theme, a tribute to all those who worked diligently in the mills
and mines in and around Pittsburgh.
One mural depicts the fire and collapse of one of the coal burning mills and as
a Croatian mother cradles her dead son, her other three sons rush into the mill
to save their fellow workers and are killed.
A committed pacifist, the intensity of Vanka's
beliefs are depicted clearly in post-war murals. One is of the Virgin Mary
coming between two warring soldiers. Another depicts two soldiers battling each
other, yet this time it is Jesus who attempts to intercede and one of the
soldiers accidentally thrusts his bayonet into Jesus' heart.
His
Millvale murals fueled Vanka to continue his work shining a light on the story
of immigrants in America,
social justice, and the quietude of rural life. Now living in Eastern
Pennsylvania, he founded the art department at Delaware Valley College of
Science and Agriculture in New Britain
and continued to create art.
His themes of social justice are just as relevant today as
they were sixty years ago. Immigrants to
America
see that Maxo’s story is that of all of us, what it’s like to create a new life
in a new land.
On his philosophy of painting, he declared: “I
painted so that Divinity in becoming human, would make humanity divine.”
Images:~ Immigrant Mother Gives Her Sons for American Industry
~ Croatian Mother Raises Her Son for War
~Mary on the Battlefield
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