The Real Damien of Molokai, C.C. Pecknold

By C. C. Pecknold, First Things, 8 . 6 . 20

Marisol Escobar’s statue of St. Damien of Molokai has graced the statuary hall in the U.S. Capitol since 1969. The people of Hawaii chose this statue to mark their tenth anniversary of statehood. It stands out, in part, because of Escobar’s distinctive blocked style. “Marisol” (as she was called) sculpted her subjects almost as square frames, flattening them like screens upon which she could project her own presence. One critic called this “feminine playfulness” set against square “patriarchy.” Marisol said she simply preferred to see herself in her subjects this way.

Yet as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recently discovered—after claiming that Marisol’s statue represents “patriarchy and white supremacist culture”—sometimes reality resists our projections. In the case of Damien of Molokai, the reality is quite different from the flattened image upon which the New York congresswoman has projected her presence.   …

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