The Black Virgin, The Black One

sketch by Andre Hora

I've done this digital sketch after reading about a book (The Cult of the Black Virgin (1985)) by the jungian Ean Begg. There are 302 Black Virgins in France alone. The explanation of the Church doesn't make sense , they defend that the blackness of the images are accidental ( smoke or exposure to the elements) but if the face and hands have been blackened why not the coloured clothes?

"Pehaps the Virgin is black because of the Earth Godess, pehaps she is black because, like the Hindu Kali (literally "the black one"), she represents the dark, the night, the death, all those other mysteries that Western culture has repressedthrough fear of women, of female sexuality, and of dying.(...)"(Elinor W. Gadon)