Eric Braverman got his first Last Supper on a family trip to Hollywood, where he found Jesus — and the 12 apostles — in a snow globe at a wax museum gift shop.
“So I asked my mom and dad to buy it for me,” he recalls. "And they did." It was 1972 and Braverman was in first grade at Pendergast Elementary School in Phoenix, where a teacher’s comment on his report card read, “Eric’s collection of knowledge is both a joy and challenge in the classroom.” That snow globe was the first of some 2,500 Last Supper pieces in a collection Braverman would assemble over the next 50 years before opening his own museum dedicated to his fascination with such artifacts — the Last Supper Museum — in the Arizona border town of Douglas, where he moved in March 2021. 'It was dirty and nasty and hot': How a Tempe dive bar became Cheers for Valley metalheads How the world's largest Last Supper collection came to Douglas, Arizona “When I moved to Douglas, I'm like, 'What would be a fun thing to do?'" Braverman recalls. “So I bought one of the most historic buildings in the heart of town — a 115-year-old building with 13,000 square feet — and just started setting up my 2,500 Last Suppers, which is the largest Last Supper collection in the world, without dispute, and now here we are running it.”
We would verify Braverman's claim with the Last Supper Collection Authority if such a thing existed. The Last Supper Museum collection includes the most famous Last Supper of all — Leonardo da Vinci's. The original is still in the refectory of the Convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan. But there's a print of the da Vinci piece "in a nice frame so people can see that to kind of compare” in the Douglas museum. There's also a Last Supper etched in an ostrich egg and a Last Supper carved in a log. There's a Last Supper made entirely of Pez dispensers and another made of slippers. That last one has, of course, been titled the Last Slipper. Da Vinci's original, Braverman says, "is the most reimagined, or repurposed, redone, reconceptualized piece of art in history: Salvador Dali has done it; Andy Warhol has done it; Banksy's done it.”
Before moving to Douglas, Braverman spent 10 years running Heavy Metal Television, an online network streaming music videos 24 hours a day from his home on the west side of Phoenix. He also wrote the liner notes to the Slayer box set "Soundtrack to the Apocalypse" and hosted and produced "Metallimania," a Metallica documentary IMDB calls "the wackiest, most dangerous, and drunkest rock and roll documentary ever made." Braverman’s roots in the metal community run deep, as do his friendships with some major players on that scene. Here's how Slayer and the Last Supper Museum are connected
This is how Tom Araya, the bassist for one of the heaviest, most influential thrash bands in the history of heavy metal, Slayer, found himself on the advisory board of the Last Supper Museum, which opened Jan. 14, 2023. “He was telling me all about this museum,” Araya says. “He’s always full of ideas. And I thought it was really cool. "Then he goes, ‘I was wondering if you could help me out.’ He had a budget he wanted to put together and he mentioned to me that a friend of his had said that he would match whatever I said I would donate.” Araya came back with a number that makes him what Braverman calls “our No. 1 financial contributor of all the people in the world, even corporations.”
Araya was happy to help. “I thought, ‘I want to be a part of that,’” he says. “I like Eric. He’s a good guy. Always wants to do stuff to help people. And he’s my friend. So my wife and I decided we would help him.” It’s been a fun experience for Araya. “Eric's gotten so much done," he says. "And our enjoyment comes from his enthusiasm for it. It’s contagious. I thought, ‘This is great. He’s gonna get everybody involved in the Last Supper.’” Araya, who lives in Texas, hasn’t been to the museum yet, although he plans to get there soon. But he’s seen photographs. “I think it’s amazing,” he says. “But you have to see that kind of stuff in real life. You can’t just look at pictures.”
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