Beloved O'ahu artist Peggy Chun, who is almost completely paralyzed by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's disease), has completed a mosaic of Father Damien that took 18 months and a little help from a lot of friends.

Chun, who is able to communicate only by directing her gaze at an alphabet board, nevertheless directed the creation of an 8-by-4-foot mural made up of 50,000 small squares of paper, each painted to her specifications. The mural depicts Father Damien holding the artist's hands, and surrounded by others imploring his help, holding out their hands against a backdrop of the Moloka'i mountains. Damien, now Blessed Damien and under consideration for sainthood in the Roman Catholic Church, devoted his life to Hansen's disease patients at Kalaupapa on Moloka'i.

Chun's assistance came from 142 students at Holy Trinity School, coordinated by their teacher, Shelly Mecum. Mecum, author of the bestselling "God's Photo Album" spent a year with Chun and the round-the-clock team that assists the artist, and together the two produced a children's book, "The Watercolor Cat" (Mutual Publishing, 2007).

Mecum said the new mosaic work really is Chun's, though Chun was unable to do the actual painting. Chun watched the movie "Moloka'i" and indicated with flicks of her eyes which scenes and which of Damien's expressions were the ones she wanted. She picked the colors for the slips of paper painted by the students, as well.

"It was just like the Old Masters did — the entire composition and vision is hers," said Mecum, speaking by cell phone from her classroom at Holy Trinity. She paused and called out to the students: "Who did the painting?" They shouted, "Peggy did!"

Last fall, another artist was working with the Damien project but got too busy to complete it. Chun's condition was worsening and her friends were worried the Damien portrait might not be finished.

Mecum offered to help, not knowing how she could do that. "I went home and wept, called on God and got one word, 'Magda.' " That is a former Chun apprentice, Magdalena Hawajska, now a friend and fellow artist who flew in from Poland and completed the painting, linking the student-painted mural squares with brush strokes. With a degree in painting restoration, she was able to replicate the kinds of strokes Chun would make when she could still paint.

"If you're familiar with Peggy's work, you'll swear she painted it," Mecum said.

It is Mecum's hope to take the mural to Rome, and, if the artist is well enough, Chun with it.

But first, they hope to arrange some sort of "pilgrimage" for the work, so Islanders and others can see it before it finds a home.

Now Chun has the children at work on a new piece, of Saint Francis of Assisi, but this one will be set in Hawai'i, with mongooses, mynahs and chickens, Mecum said.

Reach Wanda A. Adams at wadams@honoluluadvertiser.com.