This soaring mural inside the Porziuncola Nuova, which houses a replica of St. Francis' small stone chapel in Assisi called “Porziuncola,” or “little portion", is found in San Francisco, California. The mural evokes the upward sweep of medieval barrel vaulting, and makes use of the rich decorative geometric elements from Giotto’s 13th century fresco cycle of the life of St. Francis in the early gothic Basilica di Santa Chiara in Assisi, Italy.

In keeping with the Medieval guild system in which apprentices learned their craft working under a master before setting up on their own, a group of six Master of Fine Art students from the Academy of Art University, San Francisco, signed on to work under the direction of Master Muralist Angela Tirrell to create a medieval referenced mural.

The mural group researched several days, then created a digital elevation of the mural wall. Next, paper templates were made of intricate banding, and gold leaf samples were made of elements such as the sun, symbolizing St. Francis, and the moon, symbolizing his sister saint, Claire. The paper templates were affixed to the mural wall in the order the viewer now sees, and having finalized the scale of all elements the students created durable cloth templates and transferred the hundreds of geometric shapes onto the wall surface, then proceeded with the meticulous hand painting and leafing, ending with thirty-three gold stars fixed within a Giotto-blue heaven. The number of stars symbolizes the age of Christ at his crucifixion.  The research stage and ensuing mural process were extensively documented by site photographer Jorge Lavorerio.

Countless hours painting in meditative silence forged a strong bond between the artists. The creation of this mural is an homage to the visionary, friend to all in need, Saint Francis of Assisi.

Mural Team: Angela Tirrell, Master Muralist; Jorge Lavorerio, Site Photographer and painter;  Academy of Art MFA students: Jonathan Ahn, Ross Bowns, Ahmad Manar Laham, Sunghoon Lee, Nick Kripolsky and Jason Zampol

A Holy Site for all denominations, the replica shrine was envisioned and donated to San Francisco by renown Stateswoman Angela Alioto, a city native of Italian heritage. Craftsmen and craftswomen of international stature were assembled to reproduce the Italian stone chapel of  Assisi which St. Francis created. Together with Dr. Elisa Stephens, President of the Academy of Art University of San Francisco, Ms. Alioto envisioned young artists assisting in painting the church, as in the Middle Ages. Dr. Stephens generously funded the mural project from start to finish.