Faith Collage

By: Hakim Mosegi

This graphic art I've made at its core is Holy Mary cradling the infant Jesus, surrounded by a fractured cropping of images of religious iconography, antique etchings, angelic beings and modern-day headlines. I created this to illustrate and convey faith, specifically Christianity and Catholicism, which has been preserved, but broken into pieces throughout the centuries of its life – still alive, but always reinterpreted by the mass media, culture and people's personal experiences.

Mary and Jesus take the focus of attention not just positionally but for context – they embody the highest seat of compassion, sacrifice and divinity. I wanted the background to be surrounded by loud visual noise: newspaper headlines like “JESUS IS ALIVE!!,” Gustave Doré’s art of the apostles and angels, and other symbols and art in the background to clash together in a chaotic, but symbolized way. 

In the end, I just wanted to put weight to it, like the past is pressing in between scripture, art and traditional media, still being anchored by something holy and sacred. Whereas Mary and Jesus are a stillness that cuts through this loud, chaotic background, as if it’s trying to breathe through a storm across the sea. I could talk more about how the dove is covering baby Jesus’ face or how there is a cross in front of Mary, but in the end I just want people to reflect on this, not just on religion, but on how we hold onto meaning even when everything around us is loud, broken or fading.