Father Claude Chauchetière had painted a large portrait of Catherine Tekakwitha one year after her death and to accomplish what he had been inspired for his consolation and of the others, which would be in April 1681. He perhaps painted this portrait with sepia ink¹ as he had painted in 1685, or later with sepia ink the images from his narration of the Sault in 1685.

He had written that the 1681 portrait was still in the chapel in 1695. Undoubtedly he had painted another of the 1681 portrait, but with oil paints for more a lasting portrait of Catherine Tekakwitha, and is presently at the Mission of Saint Francis Xavier in Kahnawake. Thus, the earliest he had painted the oil painting would be 1696 and before he would leave the Mission to reside in Québec. We have no written account when he arrived in Québec, but he left most probably when Father Pierre Cholenec completed his recount of her life at the end of March 1696. In 1695, Father Chauchetiere wrote the life of Catherine Tekakwitha. In August 1695, he had written in a letter to his brother Jean Chauchetière that he wrote her life in three parts.² Father Cholenec had completed the second and third parts of her life for him. The last entry of Father Cholenec in his recount of her life was some of the testimonials of Father Pierre Rémy, which was from a list of testimonials dated March 24, 1696.

Father Chauchetière had painted the portrait in 1681 with many symbols depicting her and her life as we see again in the 1696 oil painting. The location of the chapel was depicted on the portrait. The shoreline of the river and with the painted church had accentuated the location of the Mission at the Sault until 1689.

The chapel was pronounced by the painting of a larger church.

He has painted many red lilies on Catherine Tekakwitha’s white vest and they represent her virginity and purity. Then and before the 17th century that lilies were drawn on the robe of the Blessed Virgin Mary to symbolize Her virginity and purity. There seems to be one hundred and forty-one lilies painted on her vest including the nine lilies painted on the collar.

Catherine Tekakwitha’s vest (chemise) is painted white, would it be the vest her companion gave her before her death and the white vest representing her virginity? She had a belt around her waist that is noticed from the side contour of her vest. In 1682, Father Chauchetière wrote that the women of the village of the Mission wore on Sundays and feast days a petticoat (skirt like garment) of a blue or red blanket simply surrounding the waist. The vest would fall over this petticoat reaching only to the knees, which is a very good description of the clothes worn by her on the portrait.

The canoe represents her voyage to the Mission and those who came with her, and the way she had arrived at the Mission by the River de la Tortue and into the Saint Laurent River, or the Great River. In the canoe there are four persons, the Native from the Huron Mission of Lorette of Québec with the brother-in-law of Catherine, and both are in front and facing Catherine Tekakwitha. Catherine Tekakwitha is painted in red, representing the red blanket she had at the time she came from where she was born and baptized. In the canoe there was only places for three persons as written by Father Chauchetière, but he also painted the divine Providence behind her. He was present behind her, because He had guided Catherine Tekakwitha to the Mission as was said repeatedly by Father Chauchetière. Her blanket that she wears is blue, which was the blanket she wore for the days when she would receive Holy Communion.

Her hair is straight and parted as Father Chauchetière wrote of her appearance. Her eyes, eyelids, prominent right high cheek, her nose and broad face pronounces her Native features. Also, her round face seems to be a slight characteristic of Algonquin character, perhaps she had taken after her mother’s Algonquin facial features. Her face is of a rosy colour. This was the colour of her face when her face was transfigured soon after her death. Her left side of her face is shaded, perhaps to depict her covering of the face during her holy life. Her face inspires devotion.

Her moccasins are dark red to brown colour, which as mentioned in her life that she coloured skins red with the glue from sturgeons. Her left moccasin is painted different from her right, which is wider or loose and meaning she had walked with a limb on her left foot. Also, the left foot is not painted straight as the right foot. Father Cholenec had written that she was small and walked with a limb. She had received this injury before she met Father Jacques de Lamberville, and this infirmity had remained with her throughout her life. Also, she seems to have a small stature in appearance in the portrait, and from her femur relics in her tomb that she was slightly more than four feet and six inches in height.

There are two strands of gold beads around her neck, but she had worn a copper crucifix around her neck the last years of her life that Father Cholenec had given. There was written in Father Chauchetière’s recount of her life that she had some beads attached to her hair in the back of her when she had come to the Mission and then she had removed, and would it be she had these two strands of beads too when she came to the Mission?

He painted the Cross in her right hand and as the other paintings of her, which was how Catherine Tekakwitha had appeared to Anastasia Tegonhatsihongo as was written by Father Cholenec. Also, did Catherine Tekakwitha have her left hand over her chest, as in the portrait, when she appeared to her.
The shrub³ on her right side, would it depict the shrub that she took the thorn branches from and placed on her mat to sleep on?

drawings of 20 cm X 15.5 cm, which the hands of those he painted and especially when enlarged on paper are of the same style as the hands he painted of Catherine Tekakwitha in the 1696 portrait.

The background on the canvas had been painted before he painted Catherine Tekakwitha. The land opposite to the church and across the river is Montréal or Ville-Marie and the mountains are Laurentian Mountains.

After her death, she would have portraits to be painted of her by Father Claude Chauchetière and when portraits of her were placed on heads of the sick that they would bring about marvellous cures. God did not deprive from us of having a portrait of her, because portraits were of great importance after her holy death for cures and instruction.

¹ Sepia ink, a reddish brown pigment prepared from the inky secretions of cuttlefish. ² Father Claude Chauchetière had written to his brother that he had written the recount of the life of Catherine Tekakwitha in three parts. The first part had three books. The first book had twelve chapters and was her life before her baptism, the second book was her life she led at the Mission and the third book the particularities of her death. The second part had several revelations and other marvels. The third part was the bodily cures attributed to her by year from 1681 to 1695. ³ Northern Prickly Ash shrub.