Restored Cupola at Holy Sepulcher is Work of Fresno Artist
Episcopal News Service. April 18, 1997 [97-1746]
David Hale, Drama and Art critic for the Fresno Bee, from which this article is reprinted
It's a scenario that sounds so improbable it could only happen in a movie with one of those Hollywood happy endings. But it's the real-life adventure that A. F. "Corky" Normart has been living for three years.
Imagine yourself as Normart, a native Fresnan [and a parishioner of St. Columba's, Fresno] who has toiled in relative obscurity for 40 years in the advertising world, earning regional recognition as a leisure-time painter and stained-glass artist.
Then imagine that out of the blue, you're selected -- without international competition -- for a project of incomparable artistic and religious significance. You're to complete the restoration of the cupola in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, the holiest shrine in Christendom, where tradition says Jesus was buried and rose from the dead.
The issue of how to decorate the central architectural feature of the church rotunda, destroyed in the 1948 war and rebuilt, had been the object of many years of conflict among the major denominations that control the building. Patriarchs of the Greek Orthodox Church, the Franciscans and the Armenian Apostolic Orthodox considered and rejected countless designs submitted by artists.
But thanks to a remarkable combination of factors, Normart's design won approval. How the project grew is the topic of an exhibit at the Fresno Art Museum. In a lecture delivered at the museum, Normart said he was just as surprised as anyone might expect when he learned about his once-in-a-lifetime commission.
"That's the fairy-tale part that everybody asks about," he said. "How does a weekend watercolorist receive the most prestigious and desirable art commission in the Christian world?"
Normart downplays his importance in the project. The real significance, he insists, is that historic rapprochement of the governing church powers, an agreement that His Beatitude Torkom Manoogian, Armenian Apostolic Patriarch of Jerusalem, characterized as "a turning point for all Christendom."
The artist's first word about the project was a telephone call from Brother Donald Mansir, the project originator and at that time vice president of the Pontifical Mission to Palestine.
"I was in Sacramento for a business lunch when I heard about it," Normart said. "When he [Brother Donald] first mentioned the church, I figured he probably wanted me to put together some stained-glass windows. I didn't realize what a big deal it was. It was like telling the local owner of the Chevy agency he's been promoted to president of GM. Why me? I still ask myself the question."
For Mansir, the answer was simple: He had become acquainted with Normart and his business and artistic skills years ago while serving as principal of San Joaquin Memorial High School in Fresno.
"He's [Corky] creative, he's imaginative and he can market things very well," Mansir said. "It was very important that we be able to sell something to three different cultures. He's humble in the very best sense; he wouldn't let ego get in the way of the project."
Mansir knew something else, that Normart was ecumenically acceptable: As an Episcopalian (though baptized in the Armenian Orthodox Church), Normart would be considered neutral by custodial religious groups of the Holy Church of the Sepulcher.
Normart explained he proceeded with the design, initially preparing a series of computer-generated color renderings, then a model and supervising as various crews carried out his ideas.
"It's strange," he said. "As dazed as I was at first, there was never a question in my mind that I could pull it off. Given a problem, I know I can solve it; that's what making art is about. I've never felt restricted about non-traditional applications of various media. I think that's judged by my painting.
"But after I saw the church, I had just five weeks to get back to Jerusalem with the conceptual drawings. I ended up doing something like 40 of them on a computer. I couldn't have done it by hand. It would have taken a year."
The concept Normart developed, specifically to transcend the territorial concerns and religious problems, is a formal, abstract image. Given the antiquity of the site, it is remarkably contemporary. But as Normart explains, that was never an issue. The church already represents a hodgepodge of often-conflicting styles, acquired through the ages.
His goal was to create something "simple and strong and symmetrical that radiated from the center," something that captured the spirit of the Resurrection but does not relate directly to any individual religious group.
The design consists basically of a wreath of golden "tongues" (reinforced plaster in relief) that encircles the skylight of the dome. The image is meant to represent an explosion of light, a metaphor for the Resurrection. The dormant forms are 12 rays to designate the Apostles each tipped with three points to suggest the Trinity.
The background, an off-white that becomes brighter under the lights as it climbs the wall of the dome, is Normart's impression of the luminous cloud that led the Israelites across the desert. Clusters of stars allude to the heavens, though they're actually the artist's device "to fill the void," Normart says.
For Normart, the project's most challenging aspect proved to be the limitations on the color scheme. In an early drawing, he used purple and red to symbolize the suffering of Christ, but learned that those colors didn't fit the joy and hope associated with the Resurrection.
Another concept that included blue was discounted on the grounds, as Normart recalls, that "you can't duplicate the sky that only God created."
Normart's second test for the Patriarchs involved creating a scale model. He did that, using a bowl-shaped plastic housing for a video surveillance camera that he stumbled on at Precision Plastics in Clovis. For illumination, he installed battery-powered lighting to suggest the fiber-optic rods that create bands of light around the actual skylight. The model sits on a plastic framework about six feet high.
"You sit under it and look up as if you were seeing the dome, standing on the rotunda floor," Normart said. "That was the final test for the Patriarchs. It's amazing how close the model looks to the real thing."
It was a "wired" (nervous) Normart who met with the clerical proprietors of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in the Greek Patriarch's hall.
"The Greek was the first to sit down," Normart said. "I could see this small smile appear and a twinkle in his eyes. One by one, they all reacted the same way. I knew we had them for sure when the Greek said, 'This is an historic occasion; we have sat down together and agreed.' I've been told it was the first time in 200 years that they've met and agreed on a discretionary matter."
Apart from the historic agreement among church leaders, Normart considers it unbelievable that the project -- begun in the fall of 1994 and completed in December 1996 -- was finished so quickly.
Not that there weren't glitches, some springing from the rigid nature of individual community traditions and tangled ownership of the property.
The saving grace to Normart was the steadying influence of Mansir and technical help of "outsiders" ranging from the architectural consultant and engineering firm hired in London to an Israeli civil engineer and a host of local friends who lent initial advice and directions.
The real heroes, he says, are people like philanthropist George Doty of Rye, NY, a retired investment banker who underwrote the project with more than $2 million, and Brother Donald.
"The project never would have happened at all," said Normart, "if Brother Donald hadn't been able to put all those people together."
Normart was there January 2 when church leaders dedicated the newly restored dome for an audience restricted to the hierarchy and other dignitaries.
"I must admit it was an exciting moment," he said, watching the crowd in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher straining to catch the first glimpse, as the canvas screen was pulled away.
Normart will be the guide for two trips to the Holy Land in April for people who want to see the newly restored dome in person at Orthodox Easter services.
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