As soon as the project of a new a Way of the Cross for Lourdes was evoked, the picture of the Resurrection, as an essential theme, formed in my mind.
Through this sculpture I tried to express the “Transfiguration”, the mysterious transfer of energy through which the Spirit takes form in matter; the transfigured body of Christ is resurrected through the breath of Divine Love.
I added three new Stations which express the fulfilment of the Passion: After the death of Christ, faith engenders hope, and, through the resurrection of Christ, Divine Love is established in the spirit of man.
Here, the Way of the Cross does not end with the death of Christ as it is usually does with the 14 Stations. The 16th Station expresses the mystery of the Resurrection, the 15th announces it and the 17th confirms it.
At the same time, these three Stations open the way to the contemplation of the three theological virtues of Faith, Hope, and Charity, to which they are intrinsically linked.
This religious monument is essentially concerned with the spiritual journey of man: from hope to transcendence, from transcendence to rebirth.
In contrast to traditional Ways of the Cross, this work does not put the accent on suffering alone, but rather on the way suffering can be transcended by the love of Christ. This transcendence is revealed throughout the Passion.
It is an invitation to follow the “Way” step by step, Station by Station, towards the perpetual rebirth of the inner man.
As far as the iconography is concerned, this work has a few distinctive features. It is not a matter of presenting each Station as different scenes in the story of the Passion, for even though there is a chronological story in the Way of the Cross, I needed to move away from the temporal aspect in order to express what was timeless, since I wanted to go beyond the historical events of the Passion. In each Station I wanted to present a new spirit evoking the Gospel and spiritual messages.
This work no longer represents personalities with their antinomical dimension of good and evil and thereby avoids the conveying of moralising sentiments.
Like a symphony where different themes are repeated throughout the musical composition coming together at the end to form one complete melody, in these seventeen sculptures centred on the image of Christ, there are repeated elements, and according to the message of the Stations, these elements have their own significance in harmony with the expression of the faces, the gazes, the hands: such as the Cross, the clothes, the veils, the horizontal and vertical lines, and the light.
The musician composes with musical notes; the poet expresses himself through words, the sculptor through different shapes.
All these images are the traces of contemplations inherent to creation which become visible again through contemplation itself.
The shapes which make up the visible image, no matter how tiny, are multidimensional; each has a meaning in itself which can only be perceived through the spiritual dimension of the soul.
The fold of a piece of cloth which is too heavy, weighed down by earthly life, becomes like a breath of life reaching towards the infinity of heaven; the veins on the hands extend into the folds of a veil which continues its upward movement in vertical lines returning to the Source, and the horizontal lines little by little open towards the spiritual dimension, as it struggles with its own material nature; the Cross, defying gravity, merges with the body of Christ. All these shapes are linked together and converge towards the same essential end, towards the Light of Life, so that the invisible flow of energy may be made visible to the eye and the spirit.