Blood Re-born

Abstract

The blood of San Gennaro, the patron Saint of Naples, is re-born during an annual ritual of liquefaction. The blood of Medusa is re-born by colouring the red coral drawn from the city’s gulf and worked by local artisans. Rebirth of coagulated blood was taken up by Belgian theatre and visual artist Jan Fabre in his 2018 Naples exhibition Oro Rosso, where his red coral sculptures were paired with performative drawings of his blood. After its ‘death’, coagulated blood is re-born in image and writing. It acquires a ‘post-mortem stage of life’, as Fabre describes the temporality of his theatre.

This essay explores the post-mortem temporality of re-born blood, departing from Pio Monte della Misericordia, which houses Caravaggio’s Works of Mercy and, among others, Fabrizio Santafede’s St Peter resurrects Dorcas. This Chapel, where Fabre exhibited his sculptural self-portrait The Man who bears the Cross, houses permanently his red coral sculptures. The essay is driven by blood coagulated or implied, and draws associations between the Chapel and Fabre’s visual art, his collaboration with local artisans, his solo performances and theatre: the blood on the Cross, Caravaggio the murderer, Fabre’s blood scripture ‘the blood will rewrite its own history’, his choreographic solo The Generosity of Dorcas (2018) where a male HIV positive performer sews his costume/body in a scenography of needles and threads, and his red coral piece Liberation of Passion.

Alongside writings by Connie Palmen, David Le Breton, Judith Butler and José Esteban Muñoz, stories of violence and compassion, imposed or offered identities, are narrated. The dynamics of these relations point out to aspects of vulnerability, where mercy is requested and granted as an act of generosity or power. Post-mortem temporality becomes a rite of passage to acceptance of physical and social vulnerability, which can empower a community of mercy makers where power relations are disrupted.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The author receives funding from the TECHNE–Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Doctoral Partnership. The author would like to thank Angelos bv and Troubleyn/Jan Fabre for granting permission for the publication of images of Jan Fabre’s works.

Notes

1 I heard this phrase in 2005 from an archaeologist at the archaeological site buried under the volcano of Thera, Greece.

2 Link to the open letter: Rekto:Verso | Open letter: #metoo and Troubleyn/Jan Fabre (www.rektoverso.be)

3 Link to the verdict of the Tribunal of Antwerp (in Flemish): Uitspraak kamer AC 5, 29 april 2022 | Hoven & Rechtbanken (https://bit.ly/3Nc9Mwz)

4 The title of the 1999 novel by acclaimed Greek writer Nikos Bakolas.

5 ‘The Gypsy Faerie Queen’. Song by Nick Cave and Marianne Faithfull. Album: Negative Capability, 2018.