Hidden face of suffering Jesus emerges at St. Roch

By Beth Donze
Clarion Herald

In 2017, when work crews began emptying 145-year-old St. Roch Chapel in advance of its complete interior restoration, the chapel’s ornate “retable” – the shelved unit above a church’s main altar featuring decorated panels and niches for sacred objects – was literally vanishing.

Although the retable’s cabinet doors still held their captivating series of six painted scenes from the life of St. Roch, its woodwork was warped, thanks to Katrina’s floodwaters more than a decade earlier.

To add insult to injury, sections of the retable’s Gothic-style spindle work and a number of its exquisite floral medallions had been devoured by termites.

As he was salvaging large chunks of the retable for the piece’s own potential restoration at an offsite carpentry shop, Joseph Connor, assistant director of operations for New Orleans Catholic Cemeteries, opened the angel-painted doors of the central bottom cabinet that once housed the chapel’s tabernacle and let out an audible gasp: staring back at him was a badly torn, threadbare, yet striking painting of a sad-eyed man whom Connor instantly identified as Jesus in the midst of his passion.
“The (cabinet) doors had been closed for so long, they just didn’t realize that anything was in there,” said Sherri Peppo, executive director of New Orleans Catholic Cemeteries, of the surprise finding inside St. Roch Cemetery No. 1. “Initially, I was absolutely stunned to see it. Because of the holes and the damage to it, I did not have a lot of confidence that it could be restored.”

Four years later, New Orleans Catholic Cemeteries is happy to announce that the painting of Christ, which measures 9.25 inches tall by 8 inches wide, has been sensitively brought back to life by Italian-born, New Orleans-based conservation artist Alessia Filetti. The Clarion Herald was given an advance viewing of the restored, close-up portrait of Jesus, which will be displayed at St. Roch Chapel’s rededication ceremony, as soon as the event can safely take place.

Face of Jesus emerges

“As (Filetti) started to clean the painting, we were able to see more of the image,” said Peppo, referring to the previously hidden crown of thorns piercing Jesus’ head, blood running down his forehead and from his nose, and the texture of his hair and beard.

After repairing tears to the linen canvas, Filetti began the painstaking work of inpainting the original oil base coat, slowly adding layers to bring out the richness of the painting. Numerous layers of clear fills, with lengthy drying times between each application, were added to even out the undulating canvas – to address the typical shrinking and deformation that happens when a canvas sits torn for a long time.

“(Filetti) found that it had been preserved one time prior, which was interesting,” said Heather Veneziano, New Orleans Catholic Cemeteries’ director of public engagement and development, who oversaw the preservation project.

Veneziano was especially intrigued by a faint, cloth-like feature the original artist had painted as a sort of border around Jesus’ face – paint strokes that Filetti was able to showcase once again.

“When (a conservator from the past) restretched the painting onto a new stretcher bar, they lost that feature on the sides,” Veneziano explained. “If there was a signature, that was also lost when they re-stretched it during the previous conservation, unfortunately. We were really hoping (Filetti) would uncover a signature hidden under all that grime, but it was either lost or there wasn’t a signature to begin with.”

Could the presence of a cloth border around Christ’s face suggest that the artist was trying to capture the moment Jesus’ image appeared on Veronica’s veil? Veneziano said the painting's specific subject, along with its age – which is thought to be contemporaneous with the chapel’s 1870s construction – may never be known for sure.

“It’s just another piece of the larger puzzle of the chapel,” she said.

Saved from certain decay

Because St. Roch Chapel lacks a climate-control system, the original painting will be stored in a secure location to protect its integrity and will only be brought to the site for special Masses and events, Veneziano said. Most days, a high-quality copy will occupy the painting’s original home inside the tabernacle of the now-restored retable – a show-stopping piece of original furniture that will also make its public debut at the chapel’s rededication ceremony.

“(The painting of Jesus) is an amazing piece of art! Being able to restore it was something that none of us were sure was possible,” Veneziano said. “We think (Filetti) did a wonderful job! It actually went better than we could have hoped for.

“We’re very, very fortunate the painting even survived up to this point, because the climate of the chapel is not conducive to (its contents staying in good condition over time),” she added. “It could have been lost in so many ways – through flooding, through termites. Considering everything it has gone through, that it survived at all is amazing!”

New Orleans Catholic Cemeteries is accepting donations toward St. Roch Chapel’s restoration through Good Friday (April 2). Donors of $200 or more will have the option to commemorate themselves and/or a loved one for permanent display on the rededication plaque.

The chapel’s restoration also uncovered burial vaults, empty of human remains, inside flanking walls of the nave. The former vaults have been reconfigured into 36 cremation niches for in-chapel burials. For more information on this option, or to learn more about ways to assist the preservation effort, call (504) 596-3050; email [email protected]; or visit nolacatholiccemeteries.org.

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Pictured below, from top left: The tabernacle in which the painting of Jesus was discovered is removed from St. Roch Chapel at the start of the chapel's interior restoration in 2017; the retable – the shelved unit above the chapel’s main altar – sits in pieces, awaiting restoration. The retable has since been fully restored and will be unveiled at the chapel's future rededication ceremony; the painting of Jesus is shown as it was found by construction workers – badly torn and threadbare in a gilded frame inside the tabernacle. (Photos courtesy of New Orleans Catholic Cemeteries).