Madonna at 51: A Painterly Vision of the 21st Century Family

Madonna, Jesus and the children joins Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana on their yacht for a special birthday dinner Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1207143/Madonna-toyboy-Jesus-adopted-children-cruise-Italy.html#ixzz0OUSrmmPTOur focus is British-American Madonna, celebrating her 51st birthday with her young lover Jesus and her rainbow coalition of children. Madonna is rewriting the script on what it means to be a thriving 50-year-old woman in today’s world.

The superstar is also reinventing the ‘family’ paradigm, as a woman not discriminating between biological and adopted children. Her philanthropy ties are digging into the soil of Malawi and the kinship ties of her adopted children. Does this strategy have a familiar “it takes a village” ring to it?

Madonna and Jesus celebrating Madonna’s 51st birthday in ItalyMadonna is also a religious woman, but her status as an independent female not dressed in hijab or bowing down to the Vatican, suggests a more expansive relationship with ‘self’ and the power of her own spirituality through Kabbalah.

I’ve been thinking about the concept of ‘self’ in the world’s religions and how it works against women. Because we’ve been rewritten out of religious history in terms of our significance and influence, females are called self-indulgent and narcissistic in pursuing our own spiritual self-development — if it involves raising our own eyes towards the heavens.

Do not be surprised if Madonna takes on the relationship of women and religion as a 21st-century family mom, whose philanthropy work is taking her deeper into the developing world.

For now, I share these Manet-like photos of Madonna, celebrating her birthday in Italy. How poetic! Anne