Second Eve
SOLO EXHIBITION BY
PINKY IBARRA URMAZA
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Reflecting on her Catholic upbringing, Pinky Ibarra Urmaza explores how women in religious texts and history are often presented as allegories — from the first woman, Eve, to the Virgin Mary, to the martyrs and saints — that serve as guides on how women should ideally conduct themselves and live a life of meaning.
In Second Eve, Urmaza emphasizes the dichotomies of the concept of female scriptural characters — “ the virgin and the temptress, Mary and Eve; the pure and the sinful, Mary and Mary Magdalene. St. Irenaeus of Lyons, the first known figure to refer to the Virgin Mary as the “second Eve” around 180 AD, did so to draw a parallel between Eve and Mary, where Mary’s obedience contrasts with Eve’s disobedience. St. Irenaeus emphasized that while Eve’s actions led to the fall of humanity, it is through Mary’s that salvation will be brought about.
Obedience is one of the virtues that make a biblically good woman, and disobedience is always punishable. When Adam and Eve disobeyed God by eating the fruit from the forbidden tree, they were both banished from the garden, but Eve was further cursed with the pain of childbearing. Upon focusing on this particular part of scripture and its precedents, early religious fathers and writers bestowed upon woman the greater blame for the fall of man. Tertullian, an early Christian writer even referred to Eve as the Devil’s portal, a title to be inherited by all her woman descendants. It is important to consider that Tertullian and other early church writers were men who lived a celibate life, who knew nothing of women besides from what they were told and from their own imaginations and interpretations of what they were taught, so instead of viewing Eve as what she is – a woman tricked into disobedience – she was treated as the fruit, even as the serpent itself.
Four of Urmaza’s works which made use of found images of Mother and Child by famous painters, collaged together with book parts and found objects, attempt to reframe the narrative of motherhood. In religious texts, motherhood is often portrayed as the realization of a woman’s purpose, and childlessness often a punishment if not an affliction that only fervent prayer and unerring faith would cure.
Women in scripture are often acknowledged and celebrated not for their actions alone but for the achievements of their children, specifically their sons. Mary as the mother of Jesus is the most celebrated of all — often portrayed in blue garments as a symbol of peace and purity as the Virgin Mother, and of her regality as the Queen of Heaven and Earth. The Divine, and The Immaculate, two works where Urmaza collaged cut-outs of blue garments worn by Mary and saints in artbooks, speak of Marian veneration through the use of the color blue. In Medieval Europe, the importation of lapiz lazuli by artists from present-day Afghanistan led to the production of a rich blue pigment known as ultramarine, the cost of which was considerably grand that its use was reserved to painting images of Mary. Urmaza further melds the significance of blue with her own artistic language in The Magnificat, an assemblage made of vintage book parts in various hues of blue, and a lone butterfly wing.
Narratives about womanhood and feminine virtues must be continuously reexamined. It is through continuous reevaluation and dialogue that the character of Mary Magdalene was reframed by the Roman Catholic faith — once diminished as the poster figure for the sinful woman, now widely acknowledged as one of the most important disciples of Christ. It took a few lifetimes, however, to make this possible. Necessary changes most of the time are slow, but the world is still in its infancy, and everything is subject to growth. What Urmaza does in Second Eve is present biblical heroines, written by men — different faces of womanhood — in a female point of view — “ an essential nudge towards slow greater progress.
Exhibition writeup by Marionne Contreras
