Prayer on the Street

It occurs to me that some of the new public or street art created in response to the novel coronavirus seems to have ritual dimensions,  echoing much earlier votive images through which help was petitioned from divine or sacred realms.

For instance, I’m struck by a clever work of street art in Los Angeles by street artist Jeremy Novy, showcased in a recent article by Mike Roe ( LA-ist; 3.27.20):

https://laist.com/2020/03/27/coronavirus-la-street-art-artists-covid-19.php

On the back of a street sign, two hands are clasped in prayer, wrapped by a rosary-like string attached to a bar of soap, reminiscent of a Bible or a medallion box dedicated to the Virgin or a Saint. Soap bubbles surround the soap and hands, evocative of the hand-washing with soap we are all reminded to do multiple times a day.  The artist explains to the reporter that the work is a critique of the authorities who act as if the virus can be defeated only by “thoughts and prayers,” instead of a broader commitment to social solidarity and mutual compassion.

I wonder, though, if at another level the work might be understood as implicitly evoking the folk art form of the ex-votos, found in the Old World and Latin America, an image dedicated to an interceding Saint as a visual prayer, transmitting a fervent appeal from this world to the next. Is it possible that at this time of looming crisis, as our roadways are increasingly vacated and as we shelter in place within doors, the streets themselves are being blessed with an ancient invocation? Has the artist put part of himself into this visual prayer, which becomes a channel from the visible world in turmoil to another space--of hope, restoration, and repair?

Popular catholic imagery also seems to inform Franco Rivolli's outdoor mural on a hospital outer wall in Italy's hard-hit Lombardy region, listed as #4 in Daryl Goh's piece in The Start (3.18.20):

https://www.thestar.com.my/lifestyle/culture/2020/03/18/covid-19-how-the-art-world-is-taking-on-the-virus

The caption states,"A mural by Venice-born artist Franco Rivolli pays tribute to the heroic hospital staff in his country. It depicts a nurse wearing a face mask, with wings behind her back and cradling Italy. It can be found on a wall of the Papa Giovanni XXIII Hospital in Bergamo, Lombardy in Italy." 

Atop the image is written, "A tutti voi..Grazie" (Thanks to all of you). Here, the angelic nurse takes on Marian attributes, with fever-stricken red Italy cast in the role of the Holy Child. The imagery may parallel that of earlier paintings honoring those who protected others from plague--including Van Dyck's  "Saint Rosalie interceding for the Plague-stricken in Palermo," celebrated in  Jason Farago's recent commentary in the New York Times.   Rather like Van Dyck's Saint Rosalie, lifted up into the heavens by cherubim, Rivolli's nurse hovers between earth and heaven, blessing earthly sufferers of the latter-day plague.  This seems particularly appropriate given that medical workers are quite literally putting their lives on the line in the emergency, and that many have, or are expected, to die as a result of their heroic service.  (A March 21 report by medical staff at this hospital is published at: https://catalyst.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/CAT.20.0080 )

In a manifest sense, the written phrase, "Thanks to all of you," is addressed to the nurses, doctors and other medical professionals on the front line of the crisis. At the same time, as in Novy's hands clasped in prayer in LA, there does seem to be an intercessionary quality to the mural, mediating between visible and invisible worlds, as  the forces of the Divine are appealed to.  The image can be read, again, as a kind of ex-voto, a ritualized image blessing all those on the street below, and by extension, all those at risk throughout the nation. 

Evidently, an Iranian adaptation of Rivolli's Italian image of a nurse.

Note 1: It would appear that Rivolli's image has been repurposed in Iran, and is being digitally circulated on Instagram, with the map of Iran now substituting for Italy:

https://www.instagram.com/p/B9xGSi2hOWL/?igshid=lfy2p0st05ow

The archetypal imagery of a maternal figure caring for an infant would seem to transcend religious or national boundaries.  

Harvard's Aga Khan Islamic Arts librarian Andras Reidelmayer explains in reference to the Iranian instagram post, that the "The text at right is a very recent (and very secular) poem in Persian by the man who posted it as a comment -- Ibrahim Khalaji. His poem is about Nowruz (the traditional Persian New Year, normally a festive occasion celebrated at the Spring Equinox) and how it is different this year, grim as if winter had never left, because of the pandemic, and with everyone wearing masks one cannot see anyone smiling."