"The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa"

"The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa"

Kerry Wright

1992

Oils on Canvas

120cm x 90cm (4ft x 3ft)

It was in 1992 that I painted this image of Saint Teresa in ecstasy, the year following my mother's death. The subject matter of the painting continues my obsession with Saint Teresa and her mystical tryst with the amorous, arrow-wielding angel. The heavily layered impasto paint is applied within a strict structure, reminiscent of ecclesiastical stained glass. Saint Teresa was a cloistered Carmelite nun of the Spanish Middle Ages. The Carmelites are a contemplative Marian order of the Catholic Church, their primary object of devotion being the Blessed Virgin Mary. For this reason, I incorporated two mother and child images within the composition of the painting. One is a traditional, devotional image of the Regina Caeli (Queen of Heaven) and the other is an image of my mother and I, taken from a family photograph. I was in a state of deep anguish and mourning for my recently deceased mother when this picture was painted. It was no accident that the two mother and child images directly associate my own beloved mother with the Blessed Virgin Triumphant in Majesty. In fact, I did so deliberately. 

"The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa" (Detail)

"The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa" (Detail)

Kerry Wright

1992

Oils on Canvas

Original 120cm x 90cm (4ft x 3ft)

Detail from my 1992 painting, "The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa", revealing an image of my mother and I in the form of a devotional holy card of the Madonna & Child, secreted within the composition of the painting. The original photograph, from which this image comes, was taken in 1954 and can be viewed here:

 http://kerryoz.blogspot.com/2011/05/mum-me-1954.html

"Portrait of the Artist's Mother"

"Portrait of the Artist's Mother" 
 

Kerry Wright

1979 

Oils on canvas

60cm x 50cm (24in x 20in)

This is not a happy portrait of my beloved mother, Emily Flora Wright nee Glover (1911-1991). In reality, Mum had a bright, cheery laugh and a lovely sense of humour. She laughed often and had a wonderfully warm, giving personality. This portrait, however, captures my mother during a particularly sad period of her life, not long after the death of my father. They had been inseparable and my mother was in deep pain and mourning when I painted her portrait. It's not only Mum's sad expression and hunched demeanour that conveys the impression of loss and mourning here. It is extenuated by the sombre, cool palette of blue and grey, and by the solitary string of beads Mum is wearing around her neck, above that decidedly melancholy, drooping blue bow.