This work will live outside the computer as a Giclee on Hahnemule.

Inspired by John's incredible use of found media, his use of themes mythic and spiritual, as well as circular elements and vertical orientation I created the Black Madonna as an homage to his body of work as a whole.

We employ very different styles in our work, and indeed what an incredible experience this show has been, we have a vast difference in style, yet I think many of the messages we try to convey are similar.

I started this piece by purchasing the 4 sprockets visible in the painting at a bicycle shop and photographing them with my Sony DSC9. The Madonna herself was painted freehand in Painter8 from a graphite sketch, from there the rest was painted and assembled in Photoshop7.

I think I have spent more time reading and researching the Black Madonna's of the world, than any other artwork I have created. What I have learned could fill much more space than I have here. No matter where you look, Mary has an earlier, non-Christain source giving her a depth and richness beyond any of the jeweled adornments she wears in the church.

"Mary is the woman butchered in Rwanda, the Muslim woman raped and brutalized and left pregnant by soldiers, the single mother on welfare, working at subsistence wages, raising her children without help from the church or community or her ex-husband. She is all the women, one third of the world's population always on the move, fleeing from starvation, war, and disasters of flood, earthquake, and draught. She is the woman who mourns the slaughter of the children, the executions of the state, the torture and disappearances of men and women. She is the shadow of the old ones battered or shunted aside, institutionalized or left on the streets to wander and scavange for a living. . . . She is the one who belongs to those who have no one else. She is the one who mourns injustice, violence, insensitivity, and selfishness. She is both victim and advocate. She is singer and crier for an end to evils and unnecessary hurt." ~Magdalene Altarpiece

Dedicated to you John, thank you for your friendship and your inspiration.