Kentucky house DJ the Black Madonna has changed her name to the Blessed Madonna, following calls for her to make amendments after accusations of racial insensitivity and cultural appropriation.
The Blessed Madonna – real name Marea Stamper – announced the change in a statement shared to Twitter. The DJ explained that the Black Madonna was “a reflection of my family’s lifelong and profound Catholic devotion to a specific kind of European icon of the Virgin Mary which is dark in hue”.
However, she acknowledged that “I should have listened harder to other perspectives” on the name, adding: “My artist name has been a point of controversy, confusion, pain and frustration that distracts from things that are a thousand times more important than any single word in that name … we all have a responsibility to try and affect positive change in any way we can.”
In Christian art, the term “black madonna” refers to icons of the Virgin Mary and baby Jesus that are cast in black or dark brown.
A petition that attracted more than 1,000 signatures was launched to encourage the DJ to change her name.
In the petition for the name change, Black Catalogue label founder Monty Luke explained that the name “holds significance for catholics around the world, but especially so for black catholics in the US, Caribbean and Latin America. In addition, Detroit’s Shrine of the Black Madonna has been an important cultural figure to many interested in the idea of Black feminism and self-determination for the past 50 years.
“Religious connotations aside though, it should be abundantly clear that in 2020, a white woman calling herself ‘black’ is highly problematic.”
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The unfurling international Black Lives Matter movement has permeated through all corners of entertainment — forcing the industry to reckon with their past missteps and indiscretions.
It has seen streaming services pull films and television series with racist undertones from their catalogue. The music world has seen seminal alt-rock act Animal Collective change previous EP artworks that represent “racist” stereotypes, and amend the title of their 2003 album Here Comes the Indian. It has also seen Björk’s label change their name from One Little Indian to One Little Independent and The Dixie Chicks change their name to The Chicks over Confederate-era connotations.
