10% of the sale from this print will be donated to Palestine Children's Relief Fund. You will receive a donation receipt in the mail.
In 2004, after learning more about the Palestinian struggle from independent news sources, I became obsessed with painting this image on the apartheid wall. The Pietà is an internationally-recognized art subject and I felt that I could make a point with a Palestinian version of it. This idea brought me to Palestine in 2005 to work with the International Solidarity Movement and in 2006 I completed the mural near Qalandia checkpoint.
Specifications:
- choose your size: 9" x 12" or 12" x 16"
- choose your wooden frame style: white, black, silver
- printed on premium lustre archival paper
- domestic shipping is included
- contact me for international shipping
While painting Mary’s scarf I was reminded of the west's recent obsession with Muslim women's hijab, yet western art is full of images of Mary with her hair covered and no one bats an eye. In western secular society, a woman covering her hair can be the subject of pity, ridicule, or contempt, yet all the great religious art of Europe for millennia depicts women with their hair covered. It's something to think about.
This image is featured in the art history book Michelangelo's Vatican Pietà and its Afterlives (publication January 2023 by Routledge) by art historian and professor Lisa M. Rafanelli, Ph.D. Here is a quote from the book:
At the most basic level, Miranda’s mural quoted a recognizable work of western, sacred art—Michelangelo’s Pietà—to make a point about the equal value of Palestinian Muslim life. But in her painting and her words, she does more than that. ... Miranda makes the case that everyone inhabits and can lay claim to the universal story represented by “the Pietà.” Empathy is borne when you stand in the shoes of another; Miranda calls upon the west to reflect on its own history and recognize that the Muslim traditions that are disparaged in some quarters are in fact part of the western tradition.
Lisa M. Rafanelli, Michelangelo's Vatican Pietà and its Afterlives published by Routledge/Taylor and Francis.
