Work of your servant’s hands THE DECORATION OF THE PASCHAL CANDLE by Br. Karel Soukup One of the greatest blessings I have received being switched to carving the wax a member of this community is the opportunity for me and applying shellac tinted to share myself through artistic expression. Of all the with finely ground pigments. I occasions for me to make art, painting our community’s am comfortable and confident paschal candle is by far one of the most privileged. For enough with this technique that me, it represents the clearest opportunity I have to use I can easily create the candle’s my talent in a way that makes a direct decoration during the Triduum. impact on the community’s life, but in My first consideration is a way that frees me from the dangers that the design be fitted to the of pride and vanity. Even though my ritual and reflect the Church’s work is carried in procession through expectations of what a paschal the church and the cantor asks God for candle is. There is little guidance the grace to “sing this candle’s perfect or limitation, but it must have a praises” during the Exsultet, I am cross, with an alpha above and reminded that the candle is not to be omega below and surrounded an object of pride, but rather “a solemn by the numerals of the year. offering, the work of bees and your Next, it must integrate with its servants’ hands.” I am thankful that surroundings in the monastic my contribution is acknowledged and church. To me, that means bold praised, but even more thankful that colors and clean lines with few God is served and I am reduced to an representational or figurative anonymous servant, no more notable elements. The candle’s shape, than an insect. being extreme in the proportion My first opportunity to paint the of its height to its width, and the community’s paschal candle came in distance from which it is usually 2015. I don’t know that anyone in our viewed also dictate that simpler is community had, to that point, thought usually better and easier to read. of the candle as a unique work of art, Sometimes individuals come to but rather simply as a ritual necessity me and relate their interpretation to be ordered out of a catalogue, its of the artwork. Any meaning appearance largely an afterthought. found in the artwork is a But, Fr. Simon was then studying at St. confluence of what the piece is and Meinrad Seminary where he learned who the viewer is. I experience that Br. John Mark Falkenhain paints Paschal Candles from this even as the creator: during their candle. Fr. Simon, expressing 2017-20 by Br. Karel the making of the piece I discover his desire to do the same for our within it meaning I did not know community but unsure of his ability to was there. As I painted last year’s make that commitment, mentioned this to Br. Timothy, candle, a mingling swirl of black and white our sacristan, who then approached me about the idea. punctuated with a central burst of gold, the My techniques have changed over the past six years. phrase “a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of There was a steep learning curve at the beginning; there fire by night” (cf. Exodus 13:21–22) came to my are virtually no published resources on techniques of mind. That image of God was not a conscious paschal candle decoration. My first attempt was to use consideration as I worked out the design, but a painted-paper appliqué fused into the wax. My first both somehow came from deep within me. test went well, but when the heat gun broke on Holy This year, I explored a tetradic color harmony Saturday morning as I was finishing the final piece, the of warm and cool greens contrasted against project nearly ended in tears. The next year, I was sure oranges and purples. I am waiting for God to to have the work completed before Lent began. I’ve reveal the meaning in that to me.
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Paschal Candle A S H O RT F I L M B Y B R . K A R E L S O U K U P, O S B
stream it now at kansasmonks.org/paschalcandlefilm Summer 2020
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