A ROW has broken over the Spanish city’s unveiling of an Easter poster, created by internationally famous Seville artist Salustiano García Cruz who used his son Horatio as the model.
Spanish news outlet, LaSexta reports that the artist, reacting to homophobic comments that erupted on social media after the unveiling, said he cared not a jot about the row.
It surprised me because I wanted to make a very respectful poster … I put a lot of love into it.
He added:
I was looking for a model for a long time, but I realised that I had someone perfect at home, who is my son.
Religion News reports that the poster was commissioned and approved by the General Council of Brotherhoods, which organises Holy Week processions ahead of Easter in Seville.
As soon as it was unveiled criticism went viral on social media and a debate erupted over how a resurrected Christ should be depicted. Many called it a disgrace, inappropriate, too pretty, modernist and out of line with Seville’s Easter tradition.
It quoted the artist, above, as saying:
There is nothing revolutionary in the painting. There is contemporaneity, but all the elements that I have used are elements that have been used in the last seven centuries in sacred art.
In another interview published by El Mundo Garcia responded to criticism from conservative groups that claimed that the depiction of Jesus was “effeminate” or “homoerotic.”
A gay Christ because he looks sweet and is handsome? come on! We are in the 21st century.
His son, Horacio said of the controversy:
It caught us a little by surprise because everything was done with respect. A lot of controversy comes from the fact that the model is too good, the Christ too handsome, too attractive.
However he said he’d also has received many compliments and good wished from people.
The General Council of Brotherhoods has so far ignored calls to replace the poster before Holy Week at the end of March, and Seville Mayor José Luis Sanz labeled the controversy “artificial.”
“I like the poster,” he said, adding that not all Holy Week posters can be the same each year.
Some posters are riskier, some more classical, some are more daring.
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