On August 14 I came back to Madonnari’s international festival in Grazie di Curtaone (MN, Italy). I have been there since years, except in 2016. Every time good memories and the opportunity to meet friends from all over the world.
24 hours of chalking without stop. In the hot sun as in the wet night. Hard work, emotions and fatigue. You cannot understand if you have never been there.
The subject of the painting has to be related to religious themes so I decided to mention the gospel of Mark and the sentence Love your neighbor as yourself (Mc 12, 29-31).
A giant tired woman with curly green hair is supporting 2 child girls. One lays in the pose of the Christ in the iconography of the Pieta. She holds a white broken toy bear and she is looking to the viewer. The second child is very young and she is wearing the orange life vest to float in the water. The big woman (she looks like a boy also) is quite oniric and she is watching to the viewer direction too.
The reference is to the refugees that are escaping from their countries, both by the sea or overland. The message Love your neighbor as yourself should be understood by all people, and shared. Therefore often it is precisely the other way round.
I’m very happy that the gold medal went to my friend Federico Pillan, a very talented artist.
Thank you Andrea Zampatti for the final picture 🙂
