Posted on: Friday, April 19, 2002

Hawai'i artist finds comfort painting Mother Marianne

By Wanda A. Adams
Assistant Features Editor

Mother Marianne, as painted by Peggy Chun, worked with Hansen's Disease patients at the Kaka'ako station and in Kalaupapa, where she died in 1918.

Mother Marianne Cope was known in Kaka'ako and Kalaupapa, where she nursed Hansen's Disease patients, as a comforter and source of strength.

Nearly a century later, the image and the story of the pioneering sister of St. Francis is again a warming presence, this time for artist Peggy Chun, who was commissioned to create a watercolor portrait of Mother Marianne for the 75th anniversary of the St. Francis HealthCare System of Hawaii.

As she worked in her Nu'uanu studio, Chun was dealing with the dismaying news that she is in the early stages of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, Lou Gehrig's Disease, an ailment that runs in her family. ALS causes a progressive degeneration in the nerves, with resulting loss of function.

"I have really felt comforted by doing this portrait. It was neat having her around," said Chun, who elected to keep a print of the work, which will be unveiled May 9, the anniversary of the hospital's founding.

Chun, who is fond of saying that "watercolorists are happy people," remains her characteristic vivacious self, and is pursuing a vigorous treatment regimen.

"It's kind of a legacy painting for me," said Chun, who says she is painting as much as she can between treatments and traveling.

Although not now a practicing Roman Catholic, Chun attended parochial schools and taught at St. Francis School when she first moved to Hawai'i in 1969. There, she became friends with Sr. Grace Jose Capellas, who is now arts coordinator for St. Francis.

Last year, Sister Grace asked Chun to paint a "Hawaiian Madonna and Child" for use on St. Francis' Christmas card. The sisters call it "the joyful Madonna."

"We have quite a few pieces of her work, mostly reproductions," said Sister Grace. "They're so good for hospitals because they're so joyful and healing and Hawaiian."

When the administrators began discussing ways to commemorate the hospital's 75th anniversary, they realized that no one had ever painted a portrait of Mother Marianne who, although she didn't actually found the hospital, is the reason why the Sisters of St. Francis are in Hawai'i.

Chun was the obvious choice for the artist. "I'm so aware of spirituality. I knew that her sensitivity and insight into who Mother Marianne is and what she means to the people of the Islands and the sisters would really be depicted in the piece," Sister Grace said.

With Chun's diagnosis, that choice has a deeper resonance for Sister Grace. Mother Marianne is in the process of being considered for sainthood in the Catholic church, and part of that process is proof of miracles due to the saint's intercession. "We are always looking for miracles," said Sister Grace. "The fact that we can all pray for the intercession of Mother Marianne so that Peggy can get whatever she needs, the fact of her strong connection now to Mother Marianne ... I think this was just the right person."

Studying Mother Marianne's life, Chun said, "I really found I liked her. I kind of connected with her. She was gutsy."

The commission had been for a portrait of Mother Marianne against a backdrop of the hospitals that she helped make possible. But Chun began with a plain study, just Mother Marianne with greenery; the nuns liked it so well they plan to keep it and hang it at St. Francis West. Another original, to hang in the main medical building, will show Mother Marianne juxtaposed against a background of the Kalaupapa Peninsula.

Mother Marianne, born Barbara Koob in Germany in 1838, took the name Marianne in 1862 when she joined the Sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis in New York. She was the first female missionary to respond to the Hawaiian kingdom's request for help in caring for Hansen's Disease patients at the Kaka'ako receiving station.

In 1888, Honolulu banker Charles Bishop donated $5,000 to establish a home for girls in Kalaupapa, where Father Damien had been serving.

The government approached Cope and asked her to supervise the new home. She accepted, and along with two other sisters, moved to Kalaupapa at age 45 to care for more than a hundred homeless girls who had been sent there without families. Following Father Damien's death in 1880, the sisters also took over his duty of managing the Home for Boys at Kalawao.

Cope remained in Kalaupapa, serving and caring for Hansen's disease patients, until she died at age 80 in 1918.