Annelies Strba. Madonna

Annelies Strba (b. 1947) portrays the Blessed Mary not as the mother of God but as an ideal representative of her gender. The photo artist depicts an image of womanhood that elevates erstwhile religious intention to an abstract realm. Digital disengagement and the almost rhapsodic colouration set the stage for a surface on which to project emotions. Strba embraces the Madonnas, dismissing the transcendental and concentrating on the empathetic accent of the mother-child relationship. In choosing Maria, Strba creates the role of woman versed in pain and loss, but also one informed by purity and benevolence. Although these features were originally conceived in the composition and facial expression, the artist defamiliarises them through colour filters and the removal of contours – the dissipating figures lose themselves in their own luminosity.