18 / The Portrait

18

The Portrait

When Juliet Thompson was ten years old, she dreamed of someday painting Jesus Christ. She even began to pray about it. She felt that the portraits she had seen didn’t do Him justice—she wanted to paint Him as the “King of Men.” When she grew up, she still hoped to do this—until she met ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. That was when, she said, “I knew that no one could paint the Christ. Could the sun with the whole universe full of its radiations, or endless flashes of lightning be captured in paint?”

On the night before He arrived in New York, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá sent a Tablet to one of Juliet’s friends, saying, “On My arrival in America Miss Juliet Thompson shall paint a wonderful portrait of Me.”

When Juliet heard this news, she was flooded with emotion: “surprise and dismay, fear, joy and gratitude all mixed together.”1

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Later, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá asked Juliet, “Can you paint Me in a half hour?”

“A half hour . . . ?” she stammered. She had never finished a portrait in less than two weeks.

He said, “Well, I will give you three half hours. You mustn’t waste My time, Juliet.”

Juliet began the portrait early on a Saturday morning in June. She had decided to use pastels—powdered colors shaped into sticks. ‘Abdu’l-Bahá sat in a small, cramped space with little light. Juliet liked to work while standing, but there was only room for her to sit. She said, “I found myself faced with every kind of handicap.”

Then ‘Abdu’l-Bahá said, “I want you to paint My Servitude to God.”

Juliet was in a panic. She cried, “Only the Holy Spirit could paint Your Servitude to God. No human hand could do it. Pray for me, or I am lost. I implore You, inspire me.”

“I will pray,” He answered, “and as you are doing this only for the sake of God, you will be inspired.”

And then, Juliet said, “An amazing thing happened. All fear fell away from me and it was as though Someone Else saw through my eyes, worked through my hand.

“All the points, all the planes in that matchless Face were so clear to me that my hand couldn’t put them down quickly enough, couldn’t keep pace with the clarity of my vision. I painted in ecstasy, free as I had never been before.”2

Juliet found that this special inspiration continued each time she worked on the portrait. She wrote, “Oh, these sittings: so wonderful, yet so humanly difficult! We move from room to room, from one kind of light to another. The Master has given me three half hours, each

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time in a different room, and each time people come in and watch me. But the miraculous thing is that nothing makes any difference. The minute I begin to work the same rapture takes possession of me. Someone Else looks through my eyes and sees clearly; Someone Else works through my hand with a sort of furious precision.”3

One day, Juliet brought her pastels when she visited ‘Abdu’l-Bahá. She had thought He might pose for her, but she found Him looking tired. He smiled at Juliet and asked her what she wanted.

She hid her paints and said, “Only to be near You.”

“You must excuse Me from sitting for you today. I am not able today.”

Later that day, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá went for a walk. As Juliet was walking to the bus station, she passed ‘Abdu’l-Bahá on His walk. He stopped her, took her hand, and smiled “with indescribable tenderness.” He said, “Come tomorrow and paint, Juliet.”

He looked a bit refreshed, but Juliet was still worried about Him. She wanted to answer in one of the few Persian statements she knew, just to amuse Him. She meant to say, “If Your health is good.” But instead she said, “Agar Shumá khúb ast,” or “If You are good.”

In her diary, Juliet wrote, “I was covered with confusion. I must have amused Him!”4

‘Abdu’l-Bahá actually posed for Juliet six times, but she had completed the portrait in three half hours. At one sitting, another artist came in with a drawing she had done from a photograph. She asked ‘Abdu’l-Bahá if she could add some touches from life, so He had to change His pose.

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At the fourth sitting, Juliet began to paint while her friend Lua Getsinger sat on a couch nearby. Lua could speak Persian, and ‘Abdu’lBahá said to her in Persian, “This makes me sleepy. What shall I do?”

Juliet said, “Tell the Master, Lua, that if He would like to take a nap, I can work while He sleeps.”

Juliet wrote, “But I found that I could not. What I saw then was too sacred, too formidable. He sat still as a statue, His eyes closed, infinite peace on that chiseled face, a God-like calm and grandeur in His erect head.”5

The sixth time ‘Abdu’l-Bahá posed for Juliet, she wrote, “I didn’t put on a single stroke. I was looking at the portrait wondering what I could find to do, when He suddenly rose from His chair and said: ‘It is finished.’”6

The completed portrait was exhibited by Juliet’s friend, Reverend Percy Grant, in the chapel of his parish house. In November, when ‘Abdu’l-Bahá wished to take the portrait back with Him to Haifa, Juliet wrote to Percy, “I want to thank you too for your hospitality to the Master’s picture. . . . You have given to many an opportunity to see at least a portrayal, if a very weak one, of a dear face which I doubt if most of us will see again.”7

Juliet also sold photographs of the portrait, and she planned to give the money she earned from them to help fund the Bahá’í Temple. On the day before ‘Abdu’l-Bahá left the United States, He took Juliet’s hand and said, “I know your circumstances, Juliet. You have not complained to Me, you have said nothing, but I know them. I know your affairs are in confusion, that you have debts, that you have that

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house, that you have to take care of your mother. Now I want you to keep the money for yourself. . . . Do not feel unhappy . . . this is best.”8

A pastel painting has a distinctive appearance, but its surface is delicate. It must be carefully preserved in order to avoid smudging and damage from light, humidity, and other factors. A friend of Juliet’s wrote that the portrait was “time-damaged, it had to be restored, and Juliet felt the original was gone forever.”9 But perhaps just as treasured as the image Juliet created of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá is her heartfelt diary, where she records their many conversations during her 1909 pilgrimage, His 1911 travels in Europe, and His time in the New York area. On His last day in the United States, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá told Juliet, “Remember, I am with you always. Bahá’u’lláh will be with you always.”10

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