The artist, Michael Lucas (Photo by Mary Brenner)
Michael Lucas grew up in Houtzdale, Pennsylvania, a small coal town northwest of Altoona, the kind of place where churches cluster together on streetcorners in town and Virgin Mary statues appear in front yards for miles. Lucas never moved far from that world—he attended Penn State at University Park for both his undergraduate degree in art (graduating with distinction) and his MFA—and still lives in the area. He kept close to home in another way as well. While Lucas became a pen-and-ink artist, he always knew he wanted to work in stone. “My father was a stone mason for a portion of his working life,” he says. “The stuff that he made out of stone when I was growing up were foundations and retaining walls. He was a creative sort. I know he always wanted to make something special out of stone.”
Once Lucas became tenured at Penn State Altoona, he followed his father’s dream. Without any formal training, he “started exploring carving.” He was already working in Byzantine iconography, so it was a natural path to start carving Byzantine images. “Everything [in my studio] is a reflection of growing up in a Slavic home. I grew up with all these haunting icons, half material and half spiritual . . . I wanted to start carving icons and to see if I could capture that kind of reality.”
Without question, Lucas’s attempts at carving have been successful. He was commissioned by Andrew Gould, a liturgical architect, to carve 17 decorative limestone panels for a baptistery—a full-immersion baptismal structure—presently being built in South Carolina. Gould describes Byzantine art as “the traditional liturgical art of the Eastern Orthodox Church, which has scrupulously maintained that tradition for 1,700 years.” He says the art form has been “integrated into the beliefs, the ceremony, of the church. It’s indispensable to the Eastern Orthodox Church.” Lucas elaborates on that description when he says, “What they’re trying to do [at New World Byzantine] is revive in the New World a sense of craftsmen and beauty in liturgical art.”
Gould, who in addition to his own work as an architect puts artists and projects together, says he found Lucas when he put out a call for artists and Lucas responded. Together they worked to find the right project for Lucas’s talents. “We tossed around a few ideas, like a carved bishop’s chair,” Lucas says, but then Gould suggested the outdoor baptistery at St. John of the Ladder in Greenville, South Carolina. The project was a perfect fit.
Blueprint for the baptistery. The panels that Lucas is carving cover the lower wall. (Photo by Mary Brenner.)
Sculpture in the Byzantine tradition does not mean statuary as in a Roman Catholic church, Lucas says. “In a true orthodox church you will not find a sculpture. We’ll allow carving, but only in relief.” While some may see that as a restriction, Lucas is very comfortable with the concept. “Byzantine art is freedom within parameters. [The artist] comes up with themes; however, they are always within the parameters of established prototypes.
Lucas—of course—acknowledges, “I love history.” But in that appreciation for the past, he also understands the importance of respecting that past. “Part of my work is working within the context of something, the historical period, the genre.”
“Byzantine iconography is basically visual theology,” he continues. “Like a scribe can change handwriting but can’t change the meaning of what is there, the artist is writing an icon, not inventing. He has to stick to the prototypes and within his own individual creativity. Most artists today fear that kind of restriction. I love it that I can bounce off of the parameters. Bishop Fulton Sheen said something about ‘I don’t like being in a lazy pond floating, I like being constricted by the banks of a creek that make the water rush.’ I don’t fear that constriction.”
Gould really values Lucas’s appreciation of working within parameters. He says, “What really strikes me about [his work] is it’s not ‘in your face’ and it doesn’t overwhelm the prayerful character of the icon. That to me is the perfect example of how a tradition can be manifested in the modern age. He really gets it on an art historical level.”
For the past year and a half (including a sabbatical), Lucas has working in his studio outside Houtzdale, carving images in panels of Indiana silver buff limestone. For each panel, he makes a pencil drawing of an original design on graph paper—all designs, as with any Byzantine art, are based on geometry. Once he has Gould’s approval, Lucas then enlarges the image and begins the work of sculpting. The following photographs show some of his work.
—Therese Boyd, ’79
Lucas’s studio, complete with Byzantine chapel still under construction, sits on land his grandfather once owned. The foundation from his grandfather’s barn is still visible across the road (see right). (Photo by Mary Brenner.)
St. Fiacre of Breuil, the Irish saint of gardening and land-clearing, watches from his perch in the chimney on the studio’s outer wall. (Photo by Mary Brenner.)
Ezekiel’s vision of the four creatures, which also appear in both Daniel and Revelations, are the angel (Matthew), lion (Mark), ox (Luke), and eagle (John), and can be found throughout religious art. The ribbon in the angel’s hair (Matthew) symbolizes an archangel. (Photo by Mary Brenner.)
The Book of Mark
The Book of Luke
The Book of John
Lucas begins his work with an idea and a half-scale pencil sketch on graph paper. This will become a panel depicting Noah’s ark on Mount Ararat. (Photo by Mary Brenner.)
To keep a level of consistency in depth and form among the panels, Lucas works on a long table with a number of panels side by side. (Photo by Mary Brenner.)
Enlargement of the sketch of Noah’s ark in the Flood. The enlargement now fits the dimensions of the stone and can be sliced up to make stencils for roughing in the carving. (Photo by Mary Brenner.)