JENNIFER CARRERA TURNER

Category: Related Stories

  • “The Divine Command” Artist Clarence J. Tibado

    “The Divine Command” Artist Clarence J. Tibado

    Clarence Tibado
    “The Divine Command” oil painting by Clarence Tibado
    By Jennifer Carrera Turner

    This article is in remembrance of my great uncle Clarence J. Tibado. He was one of seven children born in Yankton, South Dakota in 1920. His family moved to Florida a few years later and settled in Lake Wales (where my mother was born).

    My grandmother, Mary (Tibado) Underhill was one of his sisters. My grandmother is also one of the people in my life who really showed me how important Jesus is. Her family grew up worshipping in the Catholic Church.

    That was definitely something that impacted my great uncle’s paintings and his strength that carried him through WWII.

    It was many years ago and only a few times that I had met my great uncle, Clarence Tibado. My mother and her 10 brothers and sisters called him “Uncle Buddy” and that’s really the name I called him too. When I was very young I was told that his paintings hung in the Smithsonian Museum in Washington, D.C. and that he lived for a time in a 27 room Spanish-Moroccan castle in Lake Wales, FL. My grandmother absolutely adored her brother. She was so proud of him and I had no idea how incredible his life story was until I was much older.

    I know now that besides what a hugely talented artist he was but also a Navy Veteran with 13 bronze stars. He served on the U.S.S. Pensacola CA24 in the Pacific. He was wounded during the battle of Iwo Jima and honorably discharged in 1945 as a Radarman 3rd Class.

    In 1954, he fell in love and married a widow named, Josephine Yarnell, a woman locally known in Lake Wales, FL as a “Princess” in that she resided in a Florida Mediterranean-Style castle named for her “La Casa de Josefina”. She was a woman of high society and also someone who cared for the needy, sacrificing a lot to make sure that people who were impoverished may have a means to survive. The marriage to Clarence Tibado was one centered upon a shared love of the arts. Josephine and her late husband (Irwin A. Yarnell) had the mansion built in the 1920’s for Josephine by a Spanish yogi named Mr. DeSoto. The fireplace in the home was salvaged from a Spanish castle, it was furnished with European antique furniture, all of the doors opened to a breezeway in the courtyard with a fountain in the center, every known species of palm tree flourished and amidst that grew surrounding botanical gardens. My great uncle Clarence and Josephine transformed this beautiful majestic estate into an art museum.

    In 1957, Clarence Tibado donated many of his war time paintings to the Smithsonian Museum. He created those paintings while he was serving aboard the U.S.S. Pensacola.

    In 1967, Josephine passed away from natural causes. “La Casa de Josephina” was placed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places in 1975.

    In the years after Josephine passed away, Clarence Tibado continued his fine arts painting and had many gallery receptions. He passed away on December 16, 2014, age 94 in Winter Haven, FL.

    The photo above is a lithograph given to my mother by her uncle Clarence Tibado. It is titled “The Divine Command”. The detail incredible. The images and what they portray, mesmerizing.

  • A Photo Changed my Life: Mission San Xavier

    A Photo Changed my Life: Mission San Xavier

    IMG_3412.JPGBy Jennifer Carrera Turner

    It was 8 years after graduating from School of the Arts and 3 years after graduating from college that as my profession as a Funeral Director which is my profession (besides my art and photography) now of 17 years that I came across this beautiful framed photograph of a Spanish church at a thrift store.  So I believe it must have discovered it in 2001.  I placed it in my living room directly above the TV because I loved it so much that every chance I had I wanted to be able to see it.

    I thought that because of the coloring and age of the photograph that I decided that it must have been created during the 1970’s. Unfortunately there is no signature or indication on this photograph as to where this church is located or whom had photographed it. My only lead was on the back it was professionally framed in New York and the framing company with an incomplete address was indicated. Therefore I wrote a letter to that framing company, I admit it was silly but at the time the internet was still in it’s infancy otherwise I would have searched that way. It was expected that I would not receive a response.  And besides I honestly could not evaluate whether it was Spanish American, Mexican or Spanish. I must say that I prayed to God so often that it’s location would be revealed to me as I was so enamoured by this Spanish style architectural church.

    Three years had passed, and as a funeral director I was making the funeral arrangements of an estranged family who had lost their father in a tragic car accident. The most important member of this family who basically were the children versus the ex wife were involved in a great family disagreement. The daughter and her mother (the ex wife) made the cremation arrangements with me and we had a special bond as I do with many of my families and I truly care for my families. After we had settled all of the decisions and I did my absolute best to make things easier for them, they returned to their very distant homes away from Florida.

    This is where my story takes its incredible turn about a month later. I received this post card from the ex-wife and it turned out that she is a photographer and artist and I had shared with her my love of all of these things. She had invited me to stay in Tucson, AZ with her and her husband, When I saw the photo on that post card it was a “nighttime shot” – but it was the exact CHURCH IN THE PHOTOGRAPH that I have had above my television all this time and that I had prayed for almost 3 years to learn where is what located. God had answered me in a way that I know I am on his path.

    This church which had turned out to be the Mission San Xavier del Bac located in Tucson, AZ. I have visited there now several times and it will remain my most cherished and beloved location on this earth. There is a side mortuary chapel to the left of the main church, twice I have left one of my photos with a request asking God to tell me why he has brought me there. It was the first Spanish Mission I had ever visited and the beginning of my obsession that would lead me to make pilgrimages to all of the other Spanish missions.

     In the photo above is the original framed photo that I purchased and the front original and back copy of the post card I had received.