“I think art must always be innovative, it is a mental process so it is always in constant transformation.”

For a few months, especially after the lockdown, I felt the need to express my  aversion towards religion, the Church, any imposition and religious dogma. It was probably all born observing and enduring the religious culture of my city (Messina), very traditionalist and conservative. I want to try to break these patterns in some way. The Blatta Madonna, for example, was born as a protest against the adoration of a divinity that does not exist, in wanting to desecrate a figure considered maternal and sacred only because it is subjected to a god. The true mother of humanity and life is Nature itself, not a human becoming the wife of god. It’s absurd.

Religion is a way, in her opinion, of not wanting to think about life and its problems, of solving them passively, just like death. Death is a problem and a drama that must absolutely be faced, it cannot be demonized by saying only that after life there is an afterlife. Religion is also a system for oppressing the masses and subduing and unifying them all in a standardized way of thinking. But we are much more than that, we are living creatures with a very high creative potential. Somehow, we are the gods.

Mariaceleste Arena

Mariaceleste is an Italian artist originally from Sicily, Mariaceleste loves the arts and has been working towards defining her artistic path for two years. She likes working with digital techniques, to create both figurative and abstract works. She likes to experiment with different techniques to bring to light her inner world and the war that burns inside her mind. Her work borders on the edge of surreal, absurd, grotesque.