Birds of Prayer

Inherent in Mary Lee Eggart’s verdant body of work is an underlying sense of order. Within compositions blooming and breathing with wild, gorgeous life are sequences and symbols, interactions and intersections—all characteristic of nature’s miraculous sense of organization, and mankind’s ancient efforts to make sense of it.

In a style reminiscent of the illuminated manuscripts of the Middle Ages, Eggart laces blue birds in morning glories and frames iris in bluebottle flies—all in the remarkably simple interest of illustrating nature’s expression of the color “Indigo” (Spectrum, 1999). Imagining earthly reflections of the spiritual world’s angelic hierarchies, according to Catholic tradition, she designates flocks of white birds as each their own choir: whooping cranes as seraphim, snow owls as cherubim, mute swans as Thrones (Choirs of Angels, 2001). From her own allegorical system—informed as it is by traditional iconographic symbols, as well as her own—she designates various birds as representative of vices and virtues, reflecting Giotto’s frescoes in the Scrovegni Chapel (Allegories of Virtue and Vice, 2003). When adorning her collection of birds and their courting rituals, she uses flora imbued with associations of matrimony. Lilacs, for example, represent love’s “first emotion” and flame vine, its passion—both flowers offering nectar to the diving ruby-throated hummingbird (Nuptial Dance, 2005).

“I think there’s something that we’re all attracted to about birds. The fact that they can fly. The great variety of their form, and how many different kinds there are. I think it just kind of focused down to that.” —Mary Lee Eggart

Though the frameworks offer an infinite set of possible lenses through which Eggart might work, the subjects of her colored pencil and watercolor pieces are consistent: flora, fauna, and faith. These threads run deep for the artist, whose lineage includes a mother who directed an arts and crafts program and a father gifted in drawing and design. Her uncle was the esteemed Louisiana painter and educator William Moreland, known for his abstract depictions of the region’s wild landscapes, which were often heavily influenced by religious iconography. From an early age she was influenced by her grandfather Fred Moreland, a botanist. Her 1997 collection titled The Botany Lesson is a tribute to his lessons on looking past physical beauty in nature to see the true wonder: how it all fits together, the symbiosis of it. It was her grandmother, Hilda Martinez Moreland (also an artist), who instilled in Eggart her deep Catholic spirituality.

[Read another Perspectives artist profile by Jordan LaHaye Fontenot on New Orleans naturalist painter Rebecca Rebouché here.]

Art was a part of her life “from the time of my first consciousness,” she says. But it all started to come together when she was an undergraduate at LSU, studying printmaking. “I started using images of plants and animals, in many cases much more abstract that what I do now. But my interest was always in the natural forms. That’s just what I was attracted to.” The birds became the centerpiece in graduate school, she says. “I think there’s something that we’re all attracted to about birds. The fact that they can fly. The great variety of their form, and how many different kinds there are. I think it just kind of focused down to that.”

Courses in late medieval and early Renaissance art as well as Christian iconography sparked Eggart’s initial interest in the possibilities of art as a symbolic visual language, introducing her to masters like Jan Van Eyck, Robert Campin, and Pieter Bruegel the Elder. But she began to truly develop her catalog of symbols later, during lunch breaks while working as a cartographer in LSU’s geography department. (Eggart says she has never brought her map making knowledge into her art as of yet, though she has plans to in the future.).

[Read Jordan LaHaye Fontenot's Perspectives profile on sculptor Dr. Lillian Bridwell Bowles, who draws inspiration from mythology, here.]

“I’d spend my breaks in LSU’s library, looking up—and this was before the Internet—birds,” she says. “I would be in the birds section of the stacks, and just look for unusual birds and birds I thought I might like to use. And I would go to the section on Christianity and symbolism, and just found some wonderful resources describing symbols from the last two thousand years in art. I loved that time there.” Though most of Eggart’s symbols are from Christian traditions, she says she often turns to other cultures and creeds to explore a range of interpretations of the natural world.

“There are many symbols associated with the pomegranate. But the one that really struck me was the idea that it has been broken open, symbolizing Christian love, open to the needs of all.” —Mary Lee Eggart

Describing how the symbols work in her 2022 painting “No Greater Love Than This,” which references the gospel verse John 15:13 “No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends”—she points to the pomegranate at the center. “There are many symbols associated with the pomegranate. But the one that really struck me was the idea that it has been broken open, symbolizing Christian love, open to the needs of all.” The fruit is surrounded by a crown of thorns, reminiscent of the Catholic symbol of the “Sacred Heart of Jesus”—“representing the love of Christ, open to all humanity”. From there, she says, she reached into her trove of symbols to enrich the composition: European goldfinches, whose faces, according to legend, are stained from attempting to ease Christ’s pain by pulling the thorns from his head. English ivy fills in the spaces, representing a devotion to friendship. And Peruvian lilies bloom; symbols of patience, empathy, respect, humor, understanding, and commitment.

Eggart’s work has long served as a mechanism for her own spiritual meditation, a way to explore concepts and traditions like the Beatitudes, the Trinity, and Novenas. “More recently,” she said, “I am digging into things that I’ve been studying, or say, a homily at Mass that strikes me.” Currently, she is working on a collection of paintings inspired by her experiences in Eucharistic Adoration—a designated time for contemplative prayer within the Catholic faith. 

Find Eggart’s work at Baton Rouge Gallery and LeMieux Galleries in New Orleans. In December 2024, BRG will showcase her newest collection. Learn more at meggart.startlogic.com.