breaking down the corpse in art
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all manner of the macabre.
d_composition is an art historical take on the body hereafter. Formed in the petri-dish of visual culture and death, it’s aimed at those who rubberneck for anything morbidly curious.
Amongst these hoardings, you’ll find hot takes on art with a dark sensibility, from ages ago til now and my latest fixations which are usually death of goth adjacent media.
moth to a flame
Gabriel von Max’s Der Anatom incorporates vanitas imagery and the symbol of the moth, forming a salon painting typical of the era, and indicative of a larger (and truly icky) predilection among artists to depict the corpse of a beautiful woman.
raft of the medusa
When Théodore Géricault’s painted The Raft of the Medusa (1818-9) he really committed 100%. He interviewed survivors, made a full-scale replica of the raft and – wait for it – borrowed body parts from the Hospital Beaujnon to create studies of decomposition.
angel of anatomy
In some kind of macabre burlesque act, Leonor Fini’s The Angel of Anatomy drops a mauve cloth away to reveal muscle and bone.