Fra Angelico (1395-1455)

Feast Day: February 18
Beatification: October 3, 1982

The earliest record of the “Angelic Painter” dates from Oct. 17, 1417, when he joined a religious confraternity under the name of Guido di Pietro. At the time, Fra Angelico was already an established painter who had received payment for work done in the church of Santo Stefano del Ponte. He likely started his artistic career illuminating missals and other religious manuscripts.

He went on to paint altarpieces and panels. Among his important early works are “Th­e Madonna of the Star,” housed in the San Marco Museum in Florence, Italy, and “Christ In Glory Surrounded by Saints and Angels,” which is kept in the National Gallery in London. Fra Angelico pioneered many stylistic trends that distinguished the early Renaissance, and that kept him at the forefront of artistic innovation in Florence.

In 1445, Fra Angelico moved to Rome where he frescoed a number of chapels in the Vatican. In 1447, he and a pupil painted frescoes for Pope Nicholas V. All that survives today are scenes from the lives of Sts. Stephen and Lawrence. Fra Angelico also served as prior of his convent in Fiesole from 1449 to 1452. In 1984, Pope St. John Paul II declared him to be the patron of Catholic artists.