Transfigured Cuteness

Being my defense of the Precious Moments Chapel

Here is an essay kindly solicited by the wonderful Mockingbird magazine regarding my visit (but by now several visits actually) to “America’s Sistine Chapel” in Carthage, Missouri. The trip was initially inspired by my late friend Brett Foster, who—anyone who knew him can relate—was in fact the very picture of childlike joy I commend in this article. I started cynically, but then decided to redirect my cynicism to calculated academic “take downs” of the place, of which there are a few out there. I hope you enjoy the piece, and get to make a visit yourself.

You can only fit so many reproduction in print (where this essay first appeared), so here are a few other illustrations of the parallels I identify (and one I might have added as well).

The Scrovegni Chapel (a.k.a. Arena Chapel) in Padua (1300) and the PMC

Arena Chapel interior in Padua and the PMC

Rembrandt’s “Hundred Guilder Print” (c. 1647) and the PMC

The Spanish Chapel in Florence (1366) and the PMC

Jan van Eyck’s Madonna of Chancellor Rolin (1435) and a mural in the PMC

Rembrandt’s Return of the Prodigal Son (c. 1669) and the PMC