Acrylic, oil, polyester resin, paper collage, glitter, map pins, and elephant dung on canvas
Not on view
Ofili depicts a black Virgin Mary with an exuberance characteristic of his work from this decade—in addition to paint he covered the canvas with glitter, resin, and pins, so that it reflects light and sparkles. He positioned the painting atop two patties of elephant dung, a substance believed to have medicinal properties, while a third patty stands in for the Virgin’s exposed breast. Ofili crafted the cherubs flying around her from images of women’s buttocks that he clipped from pornographic magazines. Through his use of unconventional materials, he updates classical depictions of the Virgin Mary to better inhabit and reflect the world in which he lives; Ofili has described his portrayal as a “hip-hop” Virgin, implicitly equating the musical genre’s “sampling” strategies with his own.
2019
Publication excerpt from MoMA Highlights: 375 Works from The Museum of Modern Art, New York (New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 2019)
Depicted on a lush, glittering ground of shimmering orange resin that recalls the gold leaf of religious icons, Ofili’s Virgin Mary is resplendent, majestic, and imperious yet also suffused with sexual potency. Close inspection reveals the delicate, fluttering cherubim surrounding her to be crafted from images of women’s buttocks clipped from pornographic magazines. The introduction of eroticism to the Christian Virgin’s sacred image is far from new. “When I go to the National Gallery and see paintings of the Virgin Mary, I see how sexually charged they are. Mine is simply
a hip-hop version,” Ofili has said.
Ofili became renowned for the use of elephant dung in his works. The material serves a dual purpose here: it is an element of the composition (he uses a ball of dried dung in place of the Virgin’s bared breast, alluding to an absent baby) and also a support for the painting, which stands on two balls of the material. Map pins letter the name of his subject on the supports; one reads “Virgin” and the other “Mary.” Ofili’s decision to lean his paintings against the wall, close to the floor, suggests that he envisions them as part of the real space of the viewer’s world rather than
the suspended space of art dictated by tradition.
Explore more
Acrylic paint
A fast-drying paint made of pigment suspended in acrylic polymer emulsion. A key difference between acrylic paint and oil paint is that acrylics are water-based whereas oils are oil-based.
Learn more →
From MoMA Design Store
Installation views
We have identified this work in the following photos from our exhibition history.
Licensing
Artwork or archival images
If you would like to reproduce an image of a work of art in MoMA's collection, or an image of a MoMA publication or archival material (including installation views, checklists, and press releases), please contact Art Resource (publication in North America) or Scala Archives (publication in all other geographic locations).
Audio and film clips
MoMA licenses archival audio and select out of copyright film clips from our film collection. At this time, MoMA produced video cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. All requests to license archival audio or out of copyright film clips should be addressed to Scala Archives at [email protected]. Motion picture film stills cannot be licensed by MoMA/Scala. For access to motion picture film stills for research purposes, please contact the Film Study Center at [email protected]. For more information about film loans and our Circulating Film and Video Library, please visit Circulating Film and Video Library.
Text from a publication or the archives
If you would like to reproduce text from a MoMA publication, please email [email protected]. If you would like to publish text from MoMA's archival materials, please fill out this permission form and send to [email protected].
Feedback
This record is a work in progress. If you have additional information or spotted an error, please fill out this feedback form.