A Catholic Art Tour de Force

In her books, Elizabeth Lev takes us on a journey to the heart of the faith and its inextricable link to art.

Michelangelo, Last Judgment fresco from the Sistine Chapel in Vatican City(VCG Wilson/Corbis via Getty Images)

Click and Clack, those lovable car mechanics of the airwaves, had many running jokes in their decades-long show, but probably none was so often used as their jabs against anyone studying art history. It was amusing to hear their wise-cracks, and for a while, you might’ve convinced me they were on to something. But then last October happened.

Where was I? Well, on October 8, I was standing outside the Vatican Museum door, shivering slightly in the (very) early morning air, waiting with my pilgrimage group for our tour guide. We didn’t have long to wait, and we were soon being ushered into the museum by none other than art historian Elizabeth Lev — living proof that dear Tom and Ray were wrong about the pitfalls of this line of study.

I’d occasionally read Lev’s contributions in Magnificat and had enjoyed each article. But I was completely unprepared for the effect of the expertise, wit, and passion of Lev combined with actually standing among the art she was expounding upon. This was no basic Vatican Museum tour, in which you’re shuffled along — with hundreds of selfie-taking tourists — and miss most of the art around you for fear of being trampled, all while trying to catch a few dates being spouted at you by some overtaxed docent.

No, Lev took us on a journey. A journey to the heart of the Catholic Church and faith and its inextricable link to art. To say I was moved by this morning trek through these most famous halls is an understatement. When it ended, all I wanted to do was run out and shout to the world, “Have you seen this? Do you know the story? Are you not moved by all this beauty and meaning?”

Instead, like most other new enthusiasts, I went home and read. And since I’m a particularly ridiculous enthusiast — mainly when it comes to books — I tried to read everything at once. After a bit, circumstances tempered my zeal and I settled down in earnest with The Tigress of Forli, Lev’s first book.

Published in 2011, this book has less to do with art and more to do with history. The titular “tigress” is a woman named Caterina Riario Sforza de Medici, whose portrait appears on the walls of the Sistine Chapel (she’s the lovely woman in blue and white on the right-hand side, carrying the bundle of sticks). Caterina was a clever, powerful woman fighting for her place in a man’s world, and Lev does an admirable job of bringing her true character to light and parsing fact from fiction in this rather wild ride of a book.

Lev’s style is quick and clear, a necessity when detailing the intrigues, feuds, and conspiracies that crisscrossed Europe during Caterina’s day. Even so, I spent much of the book wishing I’d kept a notebook next to me from the start — there were so many names and grudges and fights filling the pages that it was hard at times to keep everything straight.

This excellent book is both interesting and enlightening, and it accomplishes the twin tasks of bringing a fascinating woman to life and giving readers an understanding of her era. Doing just one of these is difficult. To do both is exemplary.

After bidding Caterina goodbye, I plunged directly into How Catholic Art Saved the Faith, a well-constructed look at what Lev terms the “Catholic Restoration.” There was a vast amount of religious chaos and confusion after Martin Luther published his 95 Theses, and the Catholic Church struggled for a while to respond. The Council of Trent brought much-needed clarity to the era, but the reformers realized that there needed to be a tangible way to teach these clarifications to the broader public. Enter art. Painters and sculptors such as Bernini, Artemisia Gentileschi, Annibale Carracci, and Caravaggio burst upon the scene, bringing with them the passion and skill and creativity necessary for drawing God’s people back to him.

Lev writes eloquently of the “unprecedented collaboration” of “prelates and painters” not just by naming people and dates, but by laying out exactly what theological truths were being called into question and how artists set about rebutting them. Divided into three main chapters, each then subdivided into seven parts, the book covers topics ranging from confession to the Eucharist to Mary to the saints. How were the lay faithful to live well? What were the duties of the clergy? What is the purpose of Holy Orders? These, and other issues are carefully explored by Lev, culminating in a final chapter detailing Michelangelo’s awe-inspiring The Last Judgment, painted between 1535 and 1541 on the altar wall of the Sistine Chapel.

Over and over throughout my reading of this book, I realized with frustration that during two recent trips to Rome I’d either looked at, been within feet of, or been within walking distance of some of the art Lev highlights. But besides the Sistine Chapel, which Lev guided us through herself, I’d had only a glimmer of the significance of what I was encountering (if I’d even noticed it was there). This realization came home even more strongly as I was working through my third Lev book, The Silent Knight.

Published in 2021, this absorbing work covers the development of Josephine art through the ages and the importance of the church’s silent knight, St. Joseph. Husband of Mary and foster-father of Jesus Joseph says nary a word in the entire Bible. Often forgotten amid the colorful array of God’s saints, this quiet, faithful carpenter from Nazareth is both a commanding witness and a powerful intercessor. Starting with the earliest artwork depicting St. Joseph (in Santa Maria Maggiore — oh, if only I’d known sooner!), Lev walks readers through his depiction over the years and how it changed as Josephine teaching developed. A patron for fathers and workers, the “Terror of Demons,” and a champion of chastity, Joseph is given new life thanks to Lev, whose strong prose and well-selected images drive home for readers the absolute necessity of this wonderful saint.

My two quibbles with these final two books are not with Lev but with her publisher, Sophia Press. Printing them on shiny paper gives the volumes a nice weight but doesn’t make for a pleasant tactile reading experience. Also, I would’ve appreciated high-quality, better-colored images of the various works Lev discusses. I often had to google the images so I could see important details more clearly. Despite these few nits, both books (along with her biography of Caterina) are well worth your purchase or library request.

It is worth mentioning again Michelangelo’s The Last Judgment. This was the culmination of my tour with Lev last October, and I was so worked up when we reached it, I had a hard time not crying right there in the middle of the chapel. Much of what Lev told us in our 20-odd minutes in the chapel can be found in How Catholic Art Saved the Faith or in her excellent Ted Talk. But there’s one more note (also mentioned in another talk) that she shared with us on that pilgrimage that I wish to tell you.

At the bottom of The Last Judgment, right in the middle, is a dark cave. It is full of demons, and one is staring straight out at the viewer, as if ready to snatch him away. As Lev so expressively told us, however, Michelangelo knew that this was a chapel and that under the spot where the demons lay in waiting would be the altar.

And atop that altar, directly between you and me and those vengeful demons, always stands a crucifix.