Pop icon Madonna has described herself as “oppressed,” saying she was tired of a gender double-standard over her relationships with younger men.
The 58-year-old singer said in an interview published Tuesday that she has endured criticism throughout her entire career despite her professional success.
“I´ve always felt oppressed,” she told Harper´s Bazaar magazine.
“A large part of that is because I´m female and also because I refuse to live a conventional life. I´ve created a very unconventional family. “I have lovers who are three decades younger than me. This makes people very uncomfortable. I feel like everything I do makes people feel really uncomfortable,” she said.
Madonna has been linked romantically to a number of men in their 20s at the time, most recently Ivorian model Aboubakar Soumahoro and earlier French choreographer Brahim Zaibat and Dutch dancer Timor Steffens.
The Material Girl — who has four children and has been married twice — also said she faced sexism in that she is often asked why she remains active as an artist.
“Did somebody go to Pablo Picasso and say, ´Okay, you´re 80 years old. Haven´t you painted enough paintings?´ No. I´m so tired of that question.”
Madonna, who last year completed a global tour for her latest album “Rebel Heart,” will soon be directing a movie, “Loved.”
Madonna wrote the screenplay for the film, an adaptation of Andrew Sean Greer´s novel “The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells” about a woman who is transported to different eras as part of psychiatric treatment for depression. (AFP)