"We Are Family"

Acrylic, wood, mirror
40 x 20cm

John 19: 26-27, Jesus asks those close to him to care for each other in his absence, this reminds me of Mark 4: 35 when Jesus seems to shun his brother and mother while at the same time embrac[ing] all of humanity as his family. I feel here Jesus is stating the sacredness of all of us.

Selected photos

Sophie's talk from the Opening Night. Artists Talk About Their Work.
Wednesday 19 March 2008, 7:00-8:30pm, in the Gallery Space.

Facilitated by Sandra Atkins.

Sophie Taptiklis: Right at the beginning when we chose our sayings I thought, oh I’m going to do that one and I’m going to use a mirror. And I really just wanted to challenge people to come and look at their reflection and to see God in their reflection. I feel it might be taken as a little bit sacrilegious. But the reason that I chose that with this saying is that as it says in the blurb, this saying “This is your mother, this is your son”, I’ve written it in Greek here, to me really reminds me of the other verse in Mark, where Jesus responds to being told his family is outside wanting to talk to him and he says “Ah, whatever, you guys are all my mother, you are all my son if you do this, or if you follow me.” And that verse has kind of always struck me as really horrible. I’ve always hated that verse. For me, family is really important. And I’ve found it really hard, you know how could he say that about his mother and her son, how could he say that everyone’s as important as them, its not cool. And with this verse I kind of like to think of Jesus, and seeing your reflection in the mirror, and if you can imagine yourself to be God’s mother and God’s son. That’s a call to care for others as if you were John, as if you were God’s son, or as if you were God’s mother. Also to see yourself as sacred as Mary Mother of God and as sacred as John. And there’s some Greek Orthodox icons I tried to copy rather poorly . . .