The Eighth Station of the Cross "Jesus meets the women of Jerusalem"

This series of the Stations of the Cross was made in the late 19th century by an artist whose work was influenced by the workshop of the Częstochowa site of pilgrimage. Stations of the Cross painted by the same artist have survived in the church at Pagramantis, but their titles are written in Lithuanian. A rather mixed crowd of followers and torturers of Jesus is depicted in the scenes from the Passion. Traditionally, the figures of Jews who assisted the soldiers are very expressive, shown making dynamic movements, and with their faces distorted by emotion. In the picture of the tenth Station, a strange person can be seen ripping the clothes off Christ: a man with a moustache and a Cossack’s hairstyle. This negative type of character could have appeared in the scene of the torture of Christ after the Russian government’s repressions against Catholics. The Imperial Russian government often sent in Cossack troops to suppress resistance. Cossacks took part in the suppression of the 1863 uprising, and in the massacre at Kražiai in 1893. This was possibly how the artist expressed his negative feelings towards an ethnic group that despised the Catholic faith.

Text author Dalia Vasiliūnienė

This series of the Stations of the Cross was made in the late 19th century by