Painter of pope adds another accolade

When Ruth Mayer first heard that the Vatican wanted her to paint a commissioned painting of Pope John Paul II, she thought it was a prank call.

She was quickly disabused of her skepticism.

But years later, when she received notice that she was selected to be the recipient of a prestigious art award in Florence, Italy, Mayer thought it was a hoax and again took some convincing.

“I didn’t believe it,” Mayer said in her gallery, Ruth Mayer Fine Art Gallery on South Coast Highway in Laguna Beach.

But indeed, Mayer received the International Leonardo da Vinci Award of Arts for lifetime achievement on Jan. 29.

She and her husband, Randy, flew to Italy and gathered at the Borghese Palace, where she stood before a panel and was presented with the Leonardo da Vinci Award plaque bearing her name.

The honor recognizes an artist whose work offers a positive message to the world.

“I was so honored to be selected and it was amazing,” Mayer said. “Then I asked them, ‘What took so long?’” she said with a laugh.

Internationally renowned for her paintings, the 81-year-old Mayer cleaves to her faith in God when creating.

She hadn’t been to Italy since 2004, when she unveiled her portrait of Pope John Paul II.

But before Mayer had created her original painting of the pontiff, who was declared a saint by Pope Francis in 2014, she had painted “I Love New York,” a cityscape of Manhattan that depicts an angel stretching out its arms behind the World Trade Center.

The piece was completed in June 2000, more than a year before planes would be flown into the building in one of the worst attacks on U.S. soil.

She moved the artwork, in which she had placed depictions of Broadway in the Hudson River, to the front of her gallery after 9/11. The storefront became the site of many prayer vigils and caught the attention of news stations and the Vatican.

In March 2004, the work took Mayer to Rome, where she attended the Holy Father’s Masses during Holy Week and Easter. She knelt before Pope John Paul II and spoke of her commission to paint him.

After returning to Laguna Beach, Mayer finished her painting, titled “Song of a Beautiful Soul.” She flew back to Rome in November of that year and unveiled the completed work, receiving a blessing and a thumb’s up from the pope.

Mayer dedicated the original oil painting to various children organizations, since her life, she said, is centered on helping children.

She raised nine children, some of whom were adopted, and has 29 grandchildren.

Proceeds from her paintings have helped raise funds for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, the Boys & Girls Club of Laguna Beach and SchoolPower, an education foundation raising money for Laguna Beach public schools.

Over an artistic career that spans more than 60 years, Mayer’s work has taken her around the globe, allowing her to capture moments in history and other events. For instance, “Tournament of Roses” is a 2002 piece commissioned by the Pasadena Tournament of Roses for its 100th anniversary Rose Bowl game.

“Las Vegas,” meanwhile, is an 8-foot-tall oil painting of the Las Vegas Strip. It garnered her a key to the city and a day dedicated to her by proclamation of the mayor’s office.

Mayer said she paints what she sees in dreams. Looking at “Walk On Water” in her gallery, she recalled the vision that inspired it — Jesus walking on water, but from the viewpoint of the fish.

“I dream them and then I put them down,” she said. “I don’t paint to please people, but when people get it, that makes it more fulfilling to me than anything else.

“I believe you’re born an artist and once you have it in you, it never leaves you. I’m from the philosophy that there’s no good artist and no bad artists. There are only different artists.”

Mayer was surrounded by art and culture growing up in the Black Hills of South Dakota on her family’s 14,000-acre ranch, where she learned to ride bareback. Visitors to the ranch — her father was well-connected — included poet Robert Frost and President Dwight Eisenhower, who gave her a set of colored pencils. She watched bullfights with her father and artist Pablo Picasso.

Her artwork has been exhibited in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Ohio, the Hubbard Museum of American West in New Mexico and the San Diego Air & Space Museum, a branch of the Smithsonian Institution.

Mayer paints at her gallery on Sundays, and after she gives visitors an art lesson, she will invite them to sign the gallery wall. It’s been a tradition since the gallery opened 30 years ago.

Mayer said she works on 10 to 14 art pieces at a time. Days after her return from Florence, she had lunch with the ambassador from the Cultural Office of the Kuwait Embassy in Washington, D.C., to discuss art.

“I have a lot of things to do,” Mayer said with a smile. “God takes me to strange places.”