Every Saint Has a Past, Every Sinner Has a Future - A Review

One Friday I felt quite stressed. And when I feel stressed, I turn to art. That day I was working in Valletta and I noticed that there was an opening of an exhibition at Spazju Kreattiv. I love the place. Malta doesn’t have many art spaces, so each opening feels very exciting. And I’m a constant visitor of this art hub, as they are very precise with art curation and direction, so I decided to check out the event curated by Lily Agius. It was an exhibition by an artist called CO-MA. The creator had chosen to portray the seven deadly sins. A postmodernism experience in modern times of sinners.

I’ll leave the photos of some artworks in the gallery. If you press on the images, they’ll be bigger lol.

What I wanted to talk about in my review was the choice of the name of the exhibition and the connection to the Conclave which happened recently.

So, for those who don’t know, Conclave is the process of selecting a Catholic pope - a holy community that has more than a billion followers. So it means that, one way or another, the process of pope election will reach a high number of those people, as well as his ideas.

A pope is the leader of the Catholic Church. Some kind of messenger between God and humans, and a religious ethalon to follow. However, historically, there were very different popes with different points of view toward some of the processes happening in the world.

Weirdly, in the description of the exhibition, one of the ex-popes, Leo X, was mentioned in the context of indulgences. And the new pope is Leo too. Recently, the newly elected pope surprised the world when he gave some comments about family, while excluding same-sex marriages and love. It was a strong tone, as the first comments of a pope are the most cited. It’s a pure PR game.

Even though I was raised as a Christian, I found myself analysing other religions as well. And the main thing I understood is that in all religions, humans are seen as flawed. With sins. With imperfections. With no perfect understanding of life. Unbalanced between giving and taking.

And what surprises me is that we are still seeking individuals who alone could represent us. Show us the example of living. Because our beliefs are too weak.

I believe that one way or another, in all religions, God is a very powerful creator, and many mention that God is everywhere. That means in our sins too. But sins can be forgiven only when they are accepted and named.

I believe that most religions have had very disgraceful moments. Because they represent humans. But most likely, religion is very needed. Especially nowadays. Because in these individualistic times, we are losing connection with any community. And this is where religion can save us.

Because every saint has a past and every sinner has a future. We can only hope that this message will reach more and more people and we will start healing as a world by understanding our own deadly sins.

Thank you to the artist and the curator for this difficult work of connecting dots. It made me think. That means the exhibition was full of concepts and content.

GALLERY