Tuesday Rostrum gets a clearer picture of Mary Magdalene

Dina Cormick is a free-lance artist based in Durban and her public commissioned artworks are widely distributed throughout Southern Africa.

Last week she treated her audience at Tuesday Rostrum held at Mbango Valley to a stunning display of art through the centuries, 996 to 2013 AD, featuring portraits of Mary Magdalene.

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Ms Cormick explained that Mary Magdalene is consistently portrayed in the Bible as a devout follower of Jesus, but in 951 AD Pope Gregory the Great maligned her reputation and, against all evidence to the contrary, declared her a prostitute, after which she was condemned and became the scapegoat for patriarchal bias. In portraits throughout time, she has been shown as exuberant, passionate, repentant and anguished.

Who then, Ms Cormick asked, is the real Mary Magdalene? She expounded on the many legends and superstitions which sprang up around her, and like most legends they were mainly fictitious, certainly very few characters have been as provocative or controversial as Mary Magdalene. Ms Cormick said that the churches, particularly in the dark ages, used a complex system of ‘Mary Magdalene’s’ to give specific moral messages to the masses

She displayed various portraits by artists such as Cezanne, Francis Bacon and Salvador Dali and finally a 1994 sculpture by renowned American feminist artist Kiki Smith showing a naked Mary Magdalene in chains.

Ms Cormick summarized that Mary Magdalene has enthralled and fascinated image makers and patriarchal society who have used and abused her for their own informative purposes. However, she looks for pictures that go beyond the projected image to be able to say “Aha! There she is!”

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