Saint Clare Vanquishes the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

For my birthday and for Christmas, my best friend Aimee of Phoenix Refashioning painted me a pretty epic painting, entitled "Saint Clare Vanquishes the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse":

( Saint Clare Vanquishes the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse )

Readers of this blog will know that Saint Clare of Assisi is my favorite saint, and, in my admittedly very much biased opinion (it was painted by my best friend! and, more importantly, for me!) this painting is just awesome. In particular, Aimee's style really works for the subject matter, giving it a quasi-medieval sort of feel.

This painting exists because of a comment I made to Aimee when we both saw together the 17th-century painting "Saint Francis Defeats the Antichrist" at the Philadelphia Museum of Art by the Mexican painter Cristóbal de Villalpando. If you live in the Philadelphia area, go see it in person. It's worth it.

( Saint Francis Defeats the Antichrist )

As the Art Musuem web page notes,

This violent confrontation is not described in any of the biographies of the famously peaceful saint. It was likely devised by the artist with the guidance of his Franciscan patrons, making it the earliest known example of this unorthodox iconography, which is found only in Mexico.

It just seemed so strange and unexpected and out of character for Francis, that I remarked that I wanted to see a painting "Saint Clare Vanquishes the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse."

And because Aimee is awesome, she painted it for me.

The painting is also evocative--I'm assuming deliberately--of the legend of St. Clare repelling the Saracens by holding up a monstrance containing the Blessed Sacrament.

( St Clare with the Scene of the Siege of Assisi )