Certain artists throughout history become quite driven with the portrayal of certain themes. Monet painted over 250 images of his water lilies in his garden in Giverny. Mondrian tried to solve the mathematical problem of form and colour with countless compositions of his famous coloured shapes.

Some art historians may explain this as an obsession with technique to capture the image in the fleeting light and colour as with the impressionist Claude Monet. Others may attribute to the numerous artworks of a single theme as the hunger to solve the visual conundrum of shape and proportion as with Mondrian.

Yet, another way of approaching this may not be described so much as an obsessive DRIVE but perhaps with a more invitational idea of being DRAWN. Perhaps, for some artist, the call is to give expression to an intuition rather than to capture the idea or solve a question.

‘Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forward.’

This quote of Soren Kierkegaard’s applies to my experience of several works of Michael Galovic where the repeated use of the image of a broken crucifix was his intuition. The meaning of the experiences only made coherent sense after numerous years.

I once received a card with Michael’s 1999 ‘Reconciliation with Aborigines’ on the cover. I was immediately taken by the image as it had used an incomplete, broken image of the crucified Christ. I resonated with this image because I had broken figure of Christ myself at my desk which I could not discard.

The figurine was a gift from a friend when I made my profession of vows as a Marist brother. The figurine mounted on a wooden base, had been damaged in one of the many transfers of communities/ ministries with which religious brothers and sisters are well familiar.

I kept the broken Christ as one of the brothers had told me of the story of the damaged statue of Christ in a bombed German church during WW2. The statue of Jesus survived however, his hands were destroyed. Someone had put a sign at the front and it reads,

‘I have no hands but yours’.

In trying to authenticate this story, my research showed several versions. Perhaps it is apocryphal?

However, what is true are the words of the Spanish mystic, St Teresa of Avila:

Christ has no body but yours,

No hands, no feet on earth but yours, Yours are the eyes with which he looks Compassion on this world,

“Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good, Yours are the hands, with which he blesses all the world.

Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, Yours are the eyes, you are his body. Christ has no body now but yours,

No hands, no feet on earth but yours, Yours are the eyes with which he looks compassion on this world.

Christ has no body now on earth but yours.”

The figure of the damaged Christ on my desk also reminds me of what Henri Nouwen shared in his 1979 book, The Wounded Healer:

“Jesus is God’s wounded healer: through his wounds we are healed.”

However, it is the personal implication of what it means to follow a wounded Christ that counsels me to keep and carry this damaged cross…

“Thus, nothing can be written about ministry without a deeper understanding of the ways in which ministers can make their own wounds available as a source of healing.”

Many years later, I had the fortune of crossing paths with Michael Galovic who introduced me to his other works. In his 2022 ‘Splendour from Above’ exhibition at Hunters Hill, I was moved by his painting, ‘Eloi Eloi Lama Azaftani?!’ A large work portraying the final words of Christ and with the same image of the broken crucifix, fallen at the base of the painting.

The intuition of Michael’s broken cross lying at the foot of the painting triggered the powerful memory of four Spanish Marist brothers, Servando, Miguel, Fernando and Julio. They were martyred in a refugee camp in Bugobe in Zaire, which is known today as the Democratic Republic of Congo.

This country borders Rwanda and was the refuge for many escaping the genocide in the mid 1990s. The attached YouTube video connects the broken Christ figure. At 3:08 of the 4 minute video, there is a scene of the brothers’ chapel. On the left hand side, there is the image of a broken crucified Christ.

YouTube video here

Though these brothers were given the opportunity to leave during the escalating violence of the refugee camp, they decided, as a community, not to abandon the people. Consequently, they were martyred on the 31 October 1996 and their bodies were found at the base of the latrine, echoing ‘Eloi Eloi Lama Azaftani?!’

In 2021, the Spanish brothers celebrated the 25th anniversary of the brave witness of these brothers with this poster featuring the broken, wounded Christ.

I believe that the recurring image of the broken crucifix in Michael’s works is motivated by other reasons known to him. Perhaps it is more in the realm of something less cognitive and more affective. Maybe it is more a mystical intuition than a cognitive consideration. It is from an energy that draws rather than drives.

The cryptic nature of this recurring image generates more questions than answers for the viewers and perhaps that is the best way to step away from any artworks. To maintain the process of contemplating questions rather than resolve with answers.

Religious artworks provoke and evoke us with more refined questions.
For me, Michael’s images reminds me of the strength in brokenness and hope amongst despair. Despite the horror of the reality of crucifixion, I like to think that we can walk into and away from Michael Galovic’s intuitive symbol of the broken crucifix with the sentiment of Elie Wiesel:

“The essential questions have no answers.

You are my question, and I am yours — and then there is dialogue.

The moment we have answers, there is no dialogue.

Questions unite people, answers divide them.”

Br Tony Leon fms
28 March 2023