This month the monastic community remembers Brother Benedict Tutty OSB on the 30th anniversary of his death.
John Gerard (Sean) Tutty was born in Hollywood, County Wicklow, on 6th July 1924. After secondary school with the Christian Brothers in Naas, County Kildare, he helped for some years in his father’s businesses in Hollywood.
He entered Glenstal on 19th November 1949, receiving the name Benedict and was professed on 21stNovember 1951. He was sent to the art school at Maredsous Abbey in 1952 where he blossomed artistically.
A year spent in Münsterschwarzach Abbey from 1961 to 1962, under the tutelage of Brother Adelmar Dölger OSB who helped him to perfect his technique as a craftsman and also widened his artistic horizons.
Back in Ireland, his career took off and he became one of the country’s foremost liturgical artists – a term he disliked. He was the right man in the right place at a time when many churches were being re-ordered after the Second Vatican Council and many new ones being built. He had an excellent working-relationship with the architect Richard Hurley, with whom he developed a close friendship.
While continuing to work on a steady stream of commissions and developing a distinctive style, Brother Benedict was a model of monastic observance – an observance flavoured with his own sardonic slant on human nature and monastic life. For many years he was elected to the Seniorate and acted as zelator – effectively assistant novice-master.
He taught the foundation-course in the Limerick School of Art and Design and held Saturday-morning art-classes for local children in his workshop.
In 1974 he contracted brucellosis, which made it impossible for him to work in his principal medium of copper. He began to experiment with terracotta, rapidly gaining a mastery of this medium. A testimony to this is the Madonna and Child presently in the reception-area of the monastery.
On the 21st March 1996 he participated enthusiastically in the celebration of the Transitus of Saint Benedict, expressing optimism for the future of the community. He died suddenly the following morning, 22nd March 1996.
May he rest in peace.