St. Teresa of Calcutta is a reference of humanity and charity towards the poorest and one of the most charismatic personalities of recent times. In her, at the end of her life, physical wear and tear, the consequence of a long life dedicated to the poorest of the poor, contrasted with the vigor of a spirit that had not lost an ounce of youth.
The work on this sculpture began when the parish of St. Albert the Great of Madrid called our workshops to commission the realization of a sculpture of the Saint. The sculpture was to be placed in a garden on the occasion of the intense work of the parish in helping the needy..
At the workshop, we spoke with Juan Carlos and explains that is the second time he has faced the challenge of portraying this great figure. The first time was for the realization of a carving for St. Mary's Cathedral in Sydney and, on that occasion, he approached the Missionaries of Charity with the idea of understanding in depth their charism and the spirit of their foundress and thus achieve a living portrait of the saint.
They themselves showed him, from the inside, what Mother Teresa was like, what was her peculiar way of smiling and addressing others, details, as told by her daughters, that escape any image captured by a camera.. The Missionaries showed her the correct use of the shari and how she wore it with the desire to help the artist bring life to the image of their foundress. In return they asked only one thing of her:
"Let your feet be your feet."
Images often try to soften imperfections, which sometimes causes them to lose the stamp of the person they represent. St. Teresa of Calculta lived a life of dedication until old age: her face, her hands and her feet testify to this. The Missionaries asked that she be faithful to her, that, in some way, her essence pulsate underneath that carving.
On this occasion, being familiar with the face of Mother Teresa has been of great help in tackling the project, which began with a sketch of the sculpture on paper in which its dimensions were defined: 1.50 m high, and it was decided to give it a stone finish given its location, on a pedestal, in an exterior. From the sketch began the modeling in clay, from which the image was extracted in resin mixed with natural stone. Finally the image was polychromed in two colors, as you can see in the photographs:
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