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| Pieta, Michaelangelo |
Whenever I think of a mom suffering because of her child getting hurt, I think of Madonna and Christ! I am not a religious person at all(and not even sure of the historical occerance of the event) but I shudder when I think of a mother having to witness the massacre of her child....... And to me one of the best work of art that captures the pathos is the Pieta by Michaelangelo Buenorati. I consider the sculpture as one of the most beautiful one in the world.....Someone of course might ask why would a sculpture that shows Mary as a young and unperturbed mom should make me cry everytime I look at it!
Of course I can go on and on........ But in short, the contradictions in the sculpture makes it so interesting. In terms of formal contradiction: even though it is a very symetrical work of art with a pyrmaidal structure as well as the circuler pattern created by the vortex of Mary's drapery, the drama comes from the interaction of the figures! Only a master can marry the stable formal elements with the disproportionate figures and make it work. If we look at the sculpture carefully and think about the relationship between the two figures, we can see how disproportionate the figures are! A grown man cannot fit on the lap of a woman in real life. But by creating the volume in Mary's drapery, Michaelangelo has effectively turned the viewer's attention from that fact!
Another contradiction is that the artist has represented Mary as a young girl rather than a older woman that Mary should be (and Christ as a much older and gaunt man). The artist has an explanation for this! He is known to have said this about his interpretation of Mary's youth:
Do you not know that chaste women stay fresh much more than those who are not chaste? How much more in the case of the Virgin, who had never experienced the least lascivious desire that might change her body?
In other words, Mary, being untouched by any sin, is shown as the young innocent with all her virtues intact! In one art historical interpretation, it has been pointed out that we are experiencing two different passage of time: a young Mary actually holding the Christ child and being content, while the viewer is experiencing the future. Anyway, I really did not want to talk about other's interpretation but my feelings about this work. A serene Mary holding the dead Christ is probably a symbol of resignation and the belief the mother has of her Son's resurrection. That face in its other worldly beauty is puryfing and calming to our soul.....
I would like to be resigned to the fact that things will happen in my daughter's life that I will not be able to fix. She will be hurt by friends and perhaps her dreams will not be fulfilled..... But as a mom I will always get hurt when she gets hurt, whether physically or emotionally! I wish that, this representation of Mother and Child will give me courage to deal with whatever befalls my child. If the God's choosen vessel Mary could endure the pain of holding her son's broken body, perhaps, I should be able to endure my baby's bruised knee........
(My heart goes out to all moms around the world who has lost their children through meaningless violance.........)
And here are my fellow Blogger Mom's with their takes an "mommyhood"! Lets start the Blog Hop(Claudine Itner's brain child!)
