Source:https://www.musee-visitation.eu/publication/fees-des-re/
Waste sorting and eco-packaging are essential. Upcycling – that is, creating new objects from old ones – seems to be a novelty in fashion. In our so-called consumer society, it is sometimes difficult to remember that our ancestors repaired their furniture and took back their clothes.
Under the same constraints, the Visitandines also recover. But having made vows of poverty, they put all their heart into it, making reuse a real art. With fairy fingers, they transform civilian clothes, wind up embroidery or even create with natural materials: wax, paper, plants … They also reuse precious materials such as jewelry or silver dishes for surprising uses but useful to their religious community life.
Let yourself be amazed by their inventiveness and their good taste….In addition to textile creations, there are those of devotional works, often referred to as “convent work”. The Visitandines make or enrich reliquaries of all kinds. They perform many representations of saints and scenes from their lives. They show the greatest patience to achieve them, with often admirable results. But they often use simple and inexpensive materials: wood, fabrics, paper, straw, glass, etc. If these works are important as supports for the spiritual life of the community, they are not for all, that vital.
However, the financial means of a monastery are often constrained. The many community expenses quickly put an end to the meager household income. Also, the nuns constantly try to organize their activities without “touching the purse of our dear thrifty sister”. This image of the bursar’s purse, even if it is common money, is extremely common in Visitandine archives. It is the duty of every nun to avoid drawing money from it as much as possible.
Also each brings its capacities in the most diverse tasks, and the most astonishing. Thus they handle the carpentry plane, they cart stones and mortar to build their monastery. There is even an example of a temporary bronze foundry. When they are not the ones who carry them out, they do everything they can to protect the objects in their care. Thus, they save money by keeping them as long as possible in perfect condition.
This responsibility leads them to make a number of boxes and covers. Re-employ Inheritances and gifts provide civilian pieces of gold and jewelry. . Gems and even jewelry are used to adorn sacred vessels. With the same attachment to their vow of poverty, the nuns lead original retraining. When they are fun, the small items obtained are intended to be offered to the superior for her feast, to other nuns whom you want to honor, or even to the children of friends of the community.
After years of frantic consumption of non-repairable manufactured products, many groups and other non-governmental organizations are now advocating sorting and recycling. Transport pallets become living room furniture. Upcycling is all the rage. This book will allow us to discover to what extent the Visitandines have been, for centuries, ahead of this movement. This is not a peculiarity of the Order. Before the era of globalization and the consumer society, it was natural to give a second life to objects whose manufacturing costs were significant. Now, it is clear that the daughters of François and Jeanne-Françoise have excelled in this field, through modest materials and singular recoveries.
