Ecce moneyot
Things got so bad that Christ was called Ecce MonoBecause it had an obvious, round, ape-like face. I'm talking about the Christ of Borja, Zaragoza, which went viral around 2012 because of a botched restoration that resulted in that round, incomprehensible, vaguely Munchi-esque face, which made the person responsible for the botched job a worldwide celebrity.
The lady's name was Cecilia Giménez and she died recently at the age of 94. (She was 81, and had no training as a restorer, when she committed the crime.) The original Christ figure was valuable and dated from the 19th century, but the fresco was no longer visited by anyone in that chapel five kilometers from the village; one of its ears was faded or erased over the fallen plaster. Had a professional restorer been commissioned, Christ could have been seen again in all his classical splendor, but it would have been just another bland Christ figure, no more original or striking than the one in any parish church. It seems the woman had already dared, successfully, to attempt the restoration of a saint in the small chapel. But Giménez managed to create a global icon, despite the initial criticism from experts and her claims that the work was incomplete (they would never let her finish it).
Her Holy Christ became, in a matter of days, an image that traveled the globe from screen to screen, and which in Zaragoza they have cleverly exploited, perhaps not entirely in a Christian way. Thanks to the fried Christ face, the parish now receives more than 40,000 visitors annually, and almost half a million people have already come from more than 120 countries to admire the monstrosity. Visitors who have had to pay admission, and it is estimated that this monkey-like Christ may have generated more than two million euros in profit. Needless to say, the town has set up a space, a whole museum now bearing the name of the restorer; there you can see more than thirty-eight works inspired by the deformed Christ, all kinds of paintings of visibly little value, but which 'dialogue' with the 'original' work and make everything even more comical. Above all, what sells are T-shirts. Even now they are a symbol of post-religious irony typical of hipsters rolled up.
All of this can spark much reflection. In a world where there's a fierce pursuit of creating iconic images, one woman achieved it unintentionally. The dented Christ of Borja is famous worldwide; I've even seen it on the t-shirts of characters in television series. We could also say that this Christ is all that remains of Jesus now, no longer just a caricature but a fixed grimace. That face of Christ is also a mirror of contemporary tastes. Or that this is the most present and significant face of the one who came to save us, whom we can now only look at in caricature or with the laughter of someone who views all messianic figures with boundless disillusionment. We are what remains when nothing else remains. May the Son of God return to reveal himself again. Amen. And a happy new year. Etc.
