SALZBURG.- Eight centuries after the death of St. Francis of Assisi, the Dommuseum Salzburg is looking beyond the familiar image of the medieval saint to consider how his ideas about poverty, community, nature, spirituality and care for others have continued to shape Franciscan life. On view through November 2, 2026, LebensKunst. 800 Years of Francis of Assisi brings together more than 100 objects from monasteries, museums and private collections across the German-speaking world.
The exhibition, organized in cooperation with the Franciscan Research association in Mnster, was conceived around the 800th anniversary of Francis’s death on October 3, 1226. Rather than presenting his life simply as a historical biography, the show examines what the organizers describe as a Franciscan “art of living”: a way of approaching the world through simplicity, solidarity, spiritual reflection and a sense of kinship with creation.
That approach gives the exhibition an unusually broad range. Medieval manuscripts and religious paintings appear alongside everyday objects, musical instruments and artifacts associated with monastic life. Many of the works come directly from Franciscan institutions, while others have been lent by public museums, other religious communities and private owners—around 40 lenders in all.
The exhibition begins with Francis himself, tracing his transformation from the son of a prosperous textile merchant in Assisi into the founder of a movement centered on poverty and the imitation of Christ. His early encounters with people suffering from leprosy, his rejection of family wealth, his preaching journeys, his meeting with Sultan al-Kamil in Egypt, the writing of the Franciscan Rule and his reception of the stigmata all form part of the chronology. Francis died near the Portiuncula chapel on October 3, 1226, and was canonized less than two years later.
Among the works helping to tell that story is Johann Michael Rottmayr’s 1695 painting St. Francis in a Vision of the Cross, shown alongside an early 16th-century South German image of St. Clare protecting members of her order. Together, Francis and Clare represent the two figures at the roots of the Franciscan and Clarissan traditions, which over the centuries developed into several branches for men, women and lay followers.
The exhibition also pays close attention to the practical realities of Franciscan life. A 14th-century manuscript of the Regula bullata, the papally approved Franciscan Rule, is displayed alongside a richly decorated 1517 manuscript of the Rule of the Poor Clares. Elsewhere, a 1507 foundation charter for the Franciscan monastery at Schwaz reflects the networks of communities that allowed Franciscan life to spread across Europe.
One section focuses on the Franciscan greeting Pax et Bonum—“peace and goodness”—and on preaching, travel and reconciliation. Objects range from footwear associated with St. John of Capistrano to Hanno Rhomberg’s 19th-century painting of a Franciscan friar mending a shoe. The theme also leads to Francis’s celebrated encounter with Sultan al-Kamil during the Crusades, represented by a majolica work from around 1500 attributed to the circle of Andrea della Robbia.
The curators do not shy away from the more difficult aspects of Francis’s spirituality. A section devoted to the body examines his complicated relationship with physical deprivation, illness and asceticism. Francis regarded bodily discipline as part of religious life, yet toward the end of his life he affectionately referred to his body as “Brother Donkey.” Paintings, manuscripts and even items connected with monastic cooking are used to explore the tension between abstinence and pleasure.
That theme leads naturally to death. For Francis, death was not simply an ending but a transitus, or passage. In the Canticle of the Sun, he famously referred to death as a sister. Rottmayr’s painting The Death of St. Francis and a medieval register of the dead and graves of Vienna’s Conventual Franciscans place that idea within a broader tradition of remembrance.
Social responsibility is another major strand. Francis’s encounters with people suffering from leprosy are presented as the foundation of a broader Franciscan commitment to the sick and marginalized. The exhibition connects those medieval beginnings with contemporary Franciscan work, including care for people affected by leprosy in Guinea-Bissau and the activities of Franciscans International at the United Nations.
Visitors will also encounter the more everyday economy of Franciscan communities. A 19th-century wooden carrying container from South Tyrol recalls the tradition of collecting alms. The exhibition emphasizes that begging was intended as a last resort when work did not provide enough, but over time it became strongly associated with Franciscan life. These exchanges were not entirely one-sided: friars and sisters often returned small devotional images, blessed herbs or words of blessing to those who supported them.
Perhaps the most familiar Franciscan theme is the relationship with nature. The exhibition devotes a major section to the Canticle of the Sun, in which Francis addresses the sun, moon and other parts of creation as brothers and sisters. A 14th-century manuscript of the canticle appears alongside Eva Mazzucco’s 20th-century bronze of Francis with birds and Franz von Zlow’s colorful 1922 lithograph The Sermon to the Birds.
Yet the exhibition resists turning Francis into a sentimental modern environmentalist. Its texts acknowledge that he understood nature as both beautiful and harsh. Instead, his importance lies in the idea that humanity is part of a larger community of creation—an idea that the organizers connect with contemporary concerns about ecological responsibility and Pope Francis’s 2015 encyclical Laudato si’.
Music and art form another unexpected thread. Francis was described as a “minstrel of the Lord,” and the exhibition includes a Pansymphonikon built in 1845 by the Franciscan Peter Singer. The show also highlights artists who emerged from Franciscan communities, including Lukas Plazer, Norbert Baumgartner, Fabian Barcata and Laurentius Ulrich Englisch.
The final section turns more explicitly toward faith, prayer and contemplation. Medieval Bibles, devotional objects and images of Francis in ecstasy explore the Franciscan search for God through Scripture, solitude and sensory experience. Among the objects is a 1337 manuscript depiction of the stigmatization of Francis from the Paradies monastery near Schaffhausen, as well as an unusual wax figure of the saint in ecstasy made in Rome in 1721.
One of the distinctive features of LebensKunst is that the Franciscan tradition is represented not only by objects. Eighty-one Franciscan sisters, brothers and lay members from Germany, Austria and Switzerland are taking turns being present in the galleries. Under the motto “Any questions...?” they speak with visitors about what Franciscan life means today, providing a living counterpart to the centuries-old material on display.
The exhibition is accompanied by curator-led tours, discussions, family activities and educational programs. A catalogue edited by Reinhard Gratz, Florian Mair, Benedikt Mertens and Bernd Schmies is also being published in connection with the show.
LebensKunst. 800 Years of Francis of Assisi remains on view at the Dommuseum Salzburg in the DomQuartier through November 2, 2026.
