Motherhood by Michelle Yozzo Drake

This advent season I found myself spending time with an expectant Mary...this painting was the result.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Painting "For Our Sins" by Artist Michelle Yozzo Drake

We all pray in different ways...and God comes to us in different forms.This painting was a very clear conversation with God, even if I didn't get the whole message right away!

One day after Mass my priest, Father Greg, told me he would love to see my artistic interpretation of the crucifixion. I felt overwhelmed and ill equipped to paint such a big concept and told him I couldn't do it.

Then, when I got back to my studio, I could not get this image out of my mind...I saw the painting God wanted from me. So I found an old canvas that I had painted over and used it as a test. The painting above was that test. I did not know at the time what other images would emerge in different lighting from this prayer of faith and trust. I was struggling with faith in MY ability to create...instead of HIS ability to work through me. But as I started painting I gave the work over to Him and this is what happend...

This crucifixion painting is one of my paintings that hang in St. Mary Mother of the Redeemer Parish Center. One early morning after church my husband, Rich, brought me into our dark parish center...where the painting above hangs. What I saw in the dark hallway, with light streaming in from the doors was my crucifixion painting with the hand prints of children all over it. The image below is the same painting as the one above.

When I began painting I had no idea what lay beneath this old used canvas. I later remembered a project for my parents, a painting with imprints of the hands of all their 17 grandchildren...my children and my nieces and nephews...from 3 months to 21 years old. Their hand prints are what was under the old canvas that I chose. I couldn't make that project work so I white washed the canvas to use for something else.

Father Greg saw the hand prints right away, but assumed they were my hand prints and painted on purpose.

At dusk and dawn you can see the hand prints on the crucifixion painting emerge...

See the hand prints of God's children...all of us.