"Revelation 19", a 38 x 52 inch oil painting is Lucy's first biblical painting, one of her most ambitious compositions (with the inspiration of her son, Jace's interest in the book of Revelation).
"I intended to paint a beach scene on the freshly stretched canvas. I had photos of a male Cardinal resting on a wooden fence at the edge of a dune, so I was about to begin painting. Then the sounds from a recording from my 14 year old son's Bible tapes came into my studio and I can remember saying to myself, "I've always wanted to paint from the Word. It's now or never."
"I began to pray for direction, keeping Christ at the center of the painting, symbolic of The Word. I also wanted to paint the "armies which are in heaven" following closely. I had photos for these horses because I had been painting many of the cutting horses from the Augusta Futurity that William A. Morris had commissioned me to paint for the leading money winners. They were perfect models for trying to keep up with the King of Kings!"
"The main horse, I drew in from memory, knowing I would need to get more detail later. I asked David, wouldn't it be great to get some shots of a Lipizzaner? Maybe we could find out if they were coming to an event near us."
"Believe it or not, I didn't know that within two weeks, they came to Augusta- only 30 minutes from our home. But, we were too late. The last show had already performed when we got there. My husband persevered in his attempts to persuade one of the staff to bring out a stallion who had not been worked that day. The handler acquiesced, reasoning the "old stallion" could use the exercise."
"With joints popping and clicking, the magnificent white horse with this impossibly long, perfectly groomed mane flying, was soon "performing all the steps and movements of dressage, including the Airs Above the Ground -- the Levade, the Courbette, and the Capriole" and had us in awe."*
"The trainer, on the ground with reins in hand came straight toward me for the angle I needed! I held my breath and clicked the (loud!) Hasselblad camera (that I was looking down into while being down on my knees) within just a few feet of his powerful kick! A young girl and her mom were there following the show, drinking all this in, and told us later this was more beautiful and exhilarating than the show. I'm blessed to have seen the Lipizzaners, for I'd never imagined how much the mane flew up behind them! And then the trainer told us his name: "Charisma" which means, "Gift of God!" - LUCY MCTIER