Recently, Pelican Printery House executed a commission for the Canons Regular of St. John Cantius in Chicago for a set of hand-illuminated altar cards for use in the celebration of the usus antiquior, or Tridentine Latin Mass. Now, we have featured similar work from this excellent artist here in the past on more than one occasion and we are only too happy to show this most recent example which was commissioned by St. John Cantius for the occasion of the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of the Canons.
The Canons explain the symbolism they had Pelican Printery House place into the design:
The cards include images of St. Anne and the Blessed Virgin from the high altar on the center card, St. Augustine on the epistle-side card, and St. John Cantius on the gospel-side card, being named after the “man sent from God whose name was John.”[Pelican Printery House] also incorporated Polish wildflowers into the borders of the cards in homage to our Polish roots and included violets in honor of the story that the smell of violets permeated St. Anne’s Church when St. John Cantius’s tomb was damaged. The following flowers were included:
Papaver Rhoeas (Corn Poppies, the national flower of Poland- they are the papery vermillion red flowers with feathery leaves) : Trollius europaeus (Globe Flowers- the yellow flowers that resemble roses) : Grandiflora (freesia- the multicolored flowers with twirling blooms) : Amarillis Belladonna (Pink Amaryllis- the purplish pink flowers) : Viola (violets, for St. John Cantius)
This of course is one of the key benefits that comes with commissioning bespoke liturgical art and artists: it gives one the ability to create designs that will have special, particular meaning to the parish or community for whom these objects are destined.
With that in mind, here then are the cards:
The Central Card:
The Last Gospel Card:
The Lavabo Card:
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