Europe
2004, bronze, marble, and cristal, 420 cm high

In the form of sculpted marble, the vortex of an irregular wave rises all in white. Such is the form that Jupiter assumes in this final abduction of Europa, created by Anna Chromy. He is no longer the cute bull, attractive in his equanimity, but a ferocious wave. This is the image of a historic wave that captivates us and carries us along, blindly. Instead of the little horns that the myth desired, "as transparent as the purity of a stone", a crystal globe is floating here. How will Europa, the sweet daughter of Agenor, be carried along, and where? What is her destiny? What face will the continent wear tomorrow, which has taken her name? The artist ponders this. With the visionary clarity that is hers alone, she goes back to the roots of the myth in her attempt to get a better grasp of the meaning as manifested in its present-day reality.

This depiction is her idea of Europe, on the crest of this wave. In bronze, such a young surfer, she skilfully twists her body audaciously dancing on the back of the wave in order to being taken up to the shore. This is a young and brave woman. Her beautiful face seems to bear the marks of a series of misfortunes, yet the gape of her smile suggests a burning desire to be reborn. Can the power of a smile compensate for blind force? The proportions of beauty, the power of its lucidity - can they placate and confront the delusions of power? Is Dostoevsky's prophecy still credible where he maintains that beauty will save the world? And what artist would fail to assume again this critical role in building up the future?

In Anna Chromy's view, the aesthetic destiny of Europe is inseparable from the myth that bred it. An original myth always capable of uniting the divine with the human; the earth, the sea and the sky, the peoples and the continents. A complex myth, and a most fruitful one, which has nurtured and inspired European art down the centuries to the present day, and that Anna Chromy reinterprets by directing her attention to the human and feminine factor. She entrusts to woman, the potential saviour of beauty, the complex task of portraying present-day humanity on its uncertain path. A humanity in the feminine, in all its positive varieties which this term has assumed at a historical level, and which still seeks to offer a credible contribution, to the detriment of all forms of nihilism. A Europe at last that is no longer carried away and at the mercy of furious waves, but one that is aware and passionate, forever capable of shaping its own destiny.