detail, 'Desecration'
detail, 'Desecration'
detail, 'Desecration'
detail, 'Desecration'
Desecration
Candle wax, embroidery and beads on canvas and paper
750 x 970 mm
2024
Available for purchase for R500.
"Desecration depicts a looming Virgin Mary created from candle wax drippings surrounded by rosaries and embroidered fruit. These symbols represent femininity, and the sexualisation and idealisation of women despite their modesty and ties to religion. The Virgin Suicides informs the work, as I explore the nature of cause and effect as implied in the book.
In taking inspiration from the nature of the one daughter’s suicide, carbon monoxide poisoning, I implement mediums that rely on burning to create a mark. In using spontaneous mediums like the burning of candles and matchsticks, I aim to create a link between the construction and subsequent destruction in one’s idealisation of another.
As the girls’ were heavily sexualised and romanticised in the book despite their modesty and tie to religion, I wanted to use the Catholic imagery mentioned in the book. In using candle wax and its ties to Catholicism, I constructed rosaries and the Virgin Mary herself. The cleanliness and purity of the wax deteriorates after long use and burning, creating streaky greys and yellows, its desecration."
