Help me raise tuition for my Sacred Art degree

Hello, my name is Francesca, and I have set up this GoFundMe page to raise money for wholesome education.

I have been offered a place to study at the Sacred Art School in Florence. Which is a three-year degree in goldsmithing. In all honestly I applied with little self-confidence in my work, and was shocked that I got in!

This school looks incredible! It would train me to become a true artist, focusing on beauty and tradition. Not only does the school look amazing but I would be taught in Florence, which as I am sure you know is where many of the great artists are from.

The course is 7000 euros a year. However, when taking accommodation and living expenses into account the price goes a lot higher, the school have told me that I will need to ensure about 9000 euros for living expenses for the 9 months of study each year. I truly believe that this course will enable me to enhance and become a great artist, and deliver things to the Church. The course will teach me how to make things such as chalices! What can be more beautiful than creating something to be used in the Holy Mass? God willing I will be able to raise and earn enough money by September so that I can seize this incredible opportunity.

I am from a large Catholic family of twelve children. I have been home-educated my whole life using a classical curriculum, known as MODG. Being educated in this way taught me that my faith is the most important thing and that whatever I do should be centred around it. Hence why I want to pursue my higher education in something Sacred and uplifting. After I graduated with my High School diploma in 2023, I was excited to start studying the History of Art at University. Here, in England. It was a disappointing experience. I was eager to deepen my knowledge of art, as I had only studied it for one year before starting university. Classical and religious art was what I was most looking forward to studying, I was interested to see how Christian art played its role in the development of Art History. However, once I started it did not take me long to realise that it was nothing that I had hoped it would be. I knew that it was not a Catholic University and I also knew that we would not focus solely on religious art. But I did not expect it to be as awful as it was. I found that they did not care or show any interest towards traditional art, it was simply overlooked or interpreted in an immoral way. To me, this was rather distressing. When I started studying I was at a university in London and I was there for about two months. I was so unhappy and in short, I knew that what I was doing was not going to help me grow or fruitfully deepen my knowledge. I was not yet ready to give up on the idea of studying the History of Art. Thus, I decided to give it another shot elsewhere. I transferred to another university. One that was away from the big city, in the hope that maybe part of the reason I was not enjoying it was due to the location. I transferred to this university with an open mind, hoping and praying that it would be better. And for a few weeks, I made myself believe that it was. I was trying desperately to convince myself that it was all okay. But in the end, the same happened, I started to get even lower than I was before. I knew that this was not the path God wanted me on, I was miserable. The most important thing to me is my faith. Hence why I decided to drop out of the Universities here in the UK. I love to study, and I am eager to learn but I did not think that it was worth it if I was not learning something that I felt would benefit my faith and help me to grow as a child of God. After all as children of God, we are here on earth to strive for sainthood, and to do this all we do needs to focus on our faith.

Saint John Paul II’s letter to artists in 1999 encapsulates many reasons I desire to study Sacred Art. John Paul explains that art is rooted in religious experience and artistic creativity, established over thousands of years in Churches and through Sacred Scripture. Through my studies I wish to witness this in action, to see how great masterpieces have formed artists' character and how forming such beauty shows the personality of the artist. Art plays a significant role in education and therefore is important to society.

Beauty is that which lifts our soul to higher things. It is what arouses our senses. Beauty is found all around us, as Van Gogh says, ‘If you truly love nature then you will find beauty everywhere.’ I see beauty in education, especially one that focuses on helping students to become critical thinkers and enables them to understand and appreciate God's creation.

Please pray for me and give a donation if you are able, and share my page as far as you can! And if you have any questions about anything to do with the course or if I have not been clear enough please do not hesitate to ask me :)

God Bless, Francesca

(Also, the reason that the GoFundMe page is in dollars is because I had been accepted into Holy Apostles College before I applied to the Sacred Art School in Florence. And the GoFundMe does not allow me to change it!)