Editor’s Note: Matthew Chicoine interviewed Chris Lewis via phone call on August 7th, 2025. Some of the questions/answers have been rearranged, edited, and paraphrased to provide the best reader experience without losing any integrity of the answers given.
What inspired you to start creating Catholic art?
I had been a graphic designer for a number of years and I was a convert. I converted as a practicality to get married in the Church but eventually I started to have questions about the faith I accepted, and was being pulled to learn the faith for myself which led to a profound and authentic intellectual conversion. However in my 30’s I was diagnosed with lung cancer and this experience shook me spiritually. I learned I was grateful for my gifts and thought maybe I should use these gifts to help share the faith.
I started doing Catholic art for fun and as a cathartic experience. I used to be an illustrator. And I would hand-draw everything. I went into graphic design for stability.
When I started out sharing my sketches on social media my art took off. When you started Baritus Catholic in 2018, I was still working at my full-time graphic design job. Two years later, I decided to go full-time with Baritus Catholic.
How did you decide the name of your company?
I love reading ancient history. I was reading about the fall of the barbarians to the Romans in the 300s. There was a war cry that sounded like a trumpet, it was called “baritus”. That’s actually where we get the word baritone from. The war-cry and trumpeting reminded me of the angels ushering in the end time judgement in Revelation and the war-cry at Jericho in the Book of Joshua.
I was also tired of seeing ugly things out there. So I envisioned a goal of going to war against the ugliness with beauty. The latin also had a connection to the tradition of the Church which I appreciated.
Your art beautifully combines traditional Catholic aesthetics with a modern touch. How do you achieve this balance in your creative process?
I think it was more of a consequence of my being on a computer all day during my day job. I was always using a traditional medium. During my breaks, I would slide my canvas to the side and do a doodle. It was kind of rusty at first since it had been seventeen years since I drew by hand. I didn’t want to do modern art, I was moved by traditional art. So that’s the medium I was settled into: I would sketch the ideas at work during breaks, email myself, and finish the sketch digitally.
I would send reminders to myself via text, voicemail, or email on ideas I had for a piece I was working on.
Could you share a story or experience where your artwork sparked a meaningful dialogue or connection with someone outside the Church?
I have had a lot of people contact me on my social media page. While I haven’t had that direct experience, I have had my wife experience someone asking about one of my t-shirt designs when she was out and about.
I’m not anticipating that I am going to immediately convert someone with my art, but I am hoping to get people in front of beauty again. To help plant that seed, and perhaps it will help get them asking questions. I have had a lot of people online message me telling me that my art has helped inspire them.
My job is to do beautiful work and to leave the rest to God.
What role do you see artwork and visual media playing in evangelization and deepening the Catholic faith?
The beauty of art is a singular gift given to humanity. Art is a way to bring things into the mind’s eye. Jesus became the first icon in the Incarnation. Art is a bridge to the spiritual life and things beyond this life. Saint Pope John Paul II wrote a Letter to Artists, urging artists to create art to bring people to God.
Art helped to convert me. I was intrigued by the artwork at the church. Beauty is a way to move one without the mental blocks. Mediating art and contemplating the mysteries helped inspire me to restart this work.
How do you hope your art enriches the lives of those who display it in their homes or carry it with them?
On the same point, my goal is that my work is a conduit to a better prayer life. Encouragement and inspiration in the faith are a big thing. I’m a big proponent of having sacred art in every room of the home. The Catholic faith has struggled since when we stripped a lot of the artwork from the churches after Vatican II. When we see and encounter beautiful art in the churches is not something we can’t subjectivize it like we could when looking at a blank wall or abstract art.
We look at an image of our Lord incarnate or the Blessed Virgin Mary and we encounter an objective reality.
Baritus Catholic is a family business. How do you incorporate family values and teamwork into your business practices?
At some level each of my family members are involved in the business. My daughter is the only one who is an official employee. My son will help me with the pop-up shops. My younger kids will help hang tags.
It is kind of a solitary job since I am on my computer creating the art. But my family will see me doing that work. My wife studied business in school so she handles the behind the scene things like ordering and some tax things. On paper, she is co-owner of the business. In day-to-day things she is helping run homeschool stuff for our kids.
Looking towards the future, what are your aspirations and goals for Baritus Catholic, both creatively and as a business?
The benefit of being a Catholic artist is that there’s no end to the content I can create. There’s so much tradition and stories to draw from. I will probably do this until I can’t draw anymore. With everything upturned by technology and A.I. I think it’s important to create things that are tactile. So I have been thinking about creating a book. So if I could create one book before I die that would be the goal.
Who’s your favorite saint?
Saint Peter. My business is dedicated to him under his patronage. When I learned the Lord picked him as the first pope it blew my mind. I never knew that growing up.
I sympathize with Peter in the Gospels, his tendency to say the wrong thing at the wrong time, shrinking from his faith, and even his occasional temper – yet there is this clear desire that comes across to do the right thing, to learn from Our Lord and come back. So Peter is an inspiration for me in the fact that the Lord is always bringing Peter back and Peter accepts the Lord’s help.
Where’s the best place(s) for my audience to find more of your content and artwork?
Instagram: instragram.com/barituscatholic
Facebook: facebook.com/barituscatholic
YouTube: youtube.com/@barituscatholic
About Chris Lewis:
Chris Lewis is the illustrator behind BARITUS Catholic Illustration. A convert to the Catholic faith with a professional background in graphic design and a love for illustration, this project came to fruition through a parallel journey in discovering the Truth of Christianity through Catholicism and a return to drawing after many years of setting it aside. The two paths converged after a series of spiritual and intellectual conversions in 2018, and the idea of beginning a project focused on sharing the Catholic faith through art was born. BARITUS is an artistic project dedicated to preserving the legacy of our rich Catholic artistic traditions, but in a way that resonates today.
