In defence of Piss Christ: an Aufehebung of Christianity

Title: In defence of Piss Christ: an Aufhebung of Christianity

Author: Carrie Doherty

Publication Year/Date: May 2024

Document Version: Art and Philosophy Hons dissertation

License: CC-BY-NC-ND

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/

DOI: https://doi.org/10.20933/100001303

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Abstract

(Immersion) Piss Christ by Andres Serrano has been a source of contention in the political, religious, and artistic spheres for more than three decades due to its polarising nature, particularly, the artist’s use of his own urine in juxtaposition with the crucifix. I examine the duality of the sacred and the profane within Piss Christ, evaluating it through the framework of Karl Marx’s ‘Aufhebung’ from his Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of the Right. I propose that the reactions towards this artwork have been contingent upon existing ideologies from the past and that acknowledging this can help us understand the controversy surrounding the work.

Looking to Giorgio Agamben to illustrate Serrano’s use of urine as ‘profane’only insofar as it could be considered non-sacred helps suspend the belief that the use of urine is inherently sacrilegious. Exploring the crucifix itself, particularly its use as a mimetic commodity, illuminates Serrano’s criticism of the ‘Christ-for-profit’industry. Like Marx, Serrano brings us closer to the true content of religion and capitalism with the overarching theme of suffering.

Furthermore, The Holy Bible (KJV) offers insight on urine being juxtaposed with the sacred, coalescing Serrano’s negation and preservation of traditional Christian symbolism that helps us understand the artwork further as an Aufhebung of Christianity. By analysing critiques of Piss Christ that frame it as ‘blasphemous’, we come to realise that the artwork has the potential to invoke a deep reverence for Christ through its ability to invite a mutual cognisance of suffering within its viewers and that the work has the ability to be viewed as deeply Christian.

Acknowledgments

I extend my gratitude and a heartfelt thank you to Oisin Keohane, whose dedication to teaching has been a source of inspiration to me during this time. I offer my sincerest appreciation for his unwavering commitment and support to his students. His insight has been invaluable to my work; it could not have been completed without his wisdom.

I offer my sincerest gratitude toAndres Serrano and Irina Movmyga for permitting me to use (Immersion) Piss Christ in my dissertation. I value Irina’s wishes for its success.

To my mother, there are no words to express my gratitude for the confidence she has given me. I would not have completed this were it not for her labour, unparalleled wisdom, and relentless support after the loss of my father and grandfather. She has given me strength by allowing me to be weak. I extend my thank you to her, for everything.

To my grandparents, whose contributions to my academic career have been priceless. Their kindness, love, and cups of coffee have warmed me throughout this journey. My grandmother has been a beacon of light during this time. May my grandfather rest in peace.

I owe a debt of gratitude also to Morgan, with whom I have navigated the challenges of my work and celebrated the triumphs. Her boundless encouragement has been priceless. Her grace and patience have offered light through the darkness. Her generosity has been humbling.

To Bryony, who has shared in my hardships and studied by my side throughout the entirety of our time together in academia. I thank her for the years of advice, empathy, and her unrelenting ability to guide me through adversity. Her wisdom has helped me develop as not only an academic but also as a person. I value her mind, which has been infinitely inspiring.

And to my father, whose encouragement has extended from beyond the grave. I thank him for giving me my inquisitive nature. May he rest in peace.

(Immersion) Piss Christ by

Andres Serrano

Serrano, A. (1987). (Immersion) Piss Christ. [Cibachrome print, crucifix, urine]. Image courtesy of the artist.

Introduction

Inter faeces et urinam nascimur

- St.Augustine, c. 300 – c. 400.1

St. Augustine said in the 4th century, ‘Between shit and piss we are born.’Between the bladder and bowels, organs of the taboo and profane, the womb sits as a symbol of sanctity in its production of sacred, generative life. This is a sentiment that, in its vulgarity, echoes the duality of life, in which the profane is necessary for the sacred. Immersion (Piss Christ) by AndresSerranoappealstothissentimentoftherelationshipbetweenthesacredandtheprofane, for in the profane use of ‘piss’in Serrano’s work, we have the potential to see just how sacred the work is. Piss Christ ought to be understood as not merely a blasphemous work but as a deeply religious work I propose that this understanding can be achieved by looking at the photograph through the lens of Marx’s Aufhebung. In challenging the boundaries of conventional aesthetics, it is an artwork that has been deemed blasphemous2 and viewed as a reckless abandonment of Christian tradition and seemingly poignant reminder of our descent from God and Christianity in the West. With the incorporation of supposedly deliberate transgressions against religious and societal norms, Piss Christ has been on the opposing end of many Christian conservatives in its lifetime and has still been a subject of protest in recent years, over three decades since its creation. I seek to understand this piece as a deliberate preservationofChristiantraditionthroughtheacknowledgmentofitssubversionofsuch Much of the contention around this artwork in popular media over the last few decades has been: (i) ‘Is Piss Christ blasphemous?’and (ii) ‘Even if this artwork is blasphemous, does it deserve to be censored?’ Scintillating as these debates may be, one theological and another echoing the

1‘Between shit and piss we are born.’St.Augustine, c. 300 – c. 400.

discord between organised religion and personal freedom, I propose that Piss Christ is better understood as an Aufhebung since opposing forces within the piece are at the same time transcended and reconciled. Piss Christ is the life source inter faeces et urinam; it as at once a negation, preservation, and transcendence of Christianity. Understanding this piece as a commentary on capitalism and an emblematic image of Christ’s and humanity’s suffering will help us understand how Piss Christ is an Aufhebung of Christianity. The exact notion of Aufhebung that I will be referring to is the one presented by Karl Marx in his popular ‘religion is theopium ofthepeople’passage from Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of the Right [Zur Kritik der Hegelschen Rechtsphilosophie]. I propose that by seeing this work as an Aufhebung of Christianity, and not merely a work created to ‘taunt theAmerican people’3 as politician Jesse Helms once proclaimed, we can enrichen our experiences of the piece from a religious perspective. In order to understand this work as an Aufhebung, its status of ‘blasphemous’must be considered in order to overcome the ‘blasphemy’ hurdle of the accusations that negates its status as Aufhebung. To do this, we will explore the aspects of Serrano’s work which preserve traditional Christian symbolism but have often been overlooked due to their taboo nature Before exploring the nuances of Serrano’s work which make it deeply religious despite its transgressions, we must (i) understand what Marx meant by ‘Aufhebung’, (ii) understand the historical foundations which set the tone for the outrage posited towards Serrano, and (iii) explore the arguments contested against the artwork. Finally, we will look to the Bible to help us deepen our experience of Piss Christ and understand its potential for transcending beyond sacrilege

3Van Camp, J.C. (1997) Congressional Record (Senate - May 18, 1989), Comments on Andres Serrano by Members of the United States Senate.Available at: https://home.csulb.edu/~jvancamp/361_r7.html (Accessed: 04 January 2024).

Aufhebung

Piss Christ has the ability to rope different sects of believers and non-believers alike into a mutual cognisance of human suffering. One does not need to believe in God, but to believein suffering,to appreciate Piss Christ E.EliasMerhigeputs it eloquently, ‘Likeaflame burning away the darkness, life is flesh on bone convulsing above the ground.’4 Suffering is a covenant that the human takes the moment their spirit becomes flesh. Christ was clear on his stance on suffering, telling us that it’s inevitable. He stated, ‘Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also.’5 Christ stated that those who follow in his path will endure what he did, and that included suffering. Just as the first cry of the infant marks a healthy start of respiration, so too does this crymark theirfirst acquaintancewith suffering, enteringtheworld confused and widemouthed. The symbolism in Piss Christ, however, is not only one of pain and suffering. Amelia Arenas argues, ‘there is a promise of resurrection in the way the contours of the body dissolve and the limbs become pure, burning light’, the use of urine to illuminate Christ’s suffering also illuminates his resurrection. The juxtaposition of the profane and sacred offers a sense of transcendence; the ‘sacrilegious’ use of urine helps further identify him with the divine. Piss Christ as an Aufhebung could therefore symbolise his suffering, death, and resurrection all at once. Before exploring the controversy surrounding Piss Christ, I will present the Marx quote which serves as the basis for my understanding of Aufhebung:

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. The

4Begotten (1989) 00:00:39 [DVD] Directed by Edmund Elias Merhige. U.S.: WorldArtists.

5The Holy Bible. John. 15:20. New International Version (2011). London: Hodder & Staughton.

[Aufhebung] of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is the demand for their real happiness.6

Aufhebung is (i) a word used commonly in everyday German language e.g. Abonnement aufheben (aufheben being the verb component of the noun Aufhebung) means to ‘unsubscribe’ from something like a monthly telephone bill, and (ii) a complex philosophical term adopted by Marx from the broader framework of Hegelian Dialectics 7 Aufhebung means abolition, preservation, raising, overcoming; aufheben is to destroy, suspend, preserve, to uplift.8 Within Hegel’s triadic process (though one which was not specifically formulated in the following structure by Hegel himself) of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis,9 Aufhebung traditionally encapsulates the dialectical process through implication of the negation of a thesis, the preservation of valuable elements from both the thesis and antithesis, evolving to a transcendence towards a higher level of understanding or development.10 I am solely interested in Marx’s use of Aufhebung in relation to religion within the quote presented as it has nuance to be explored. Marx’s use of Aufhebung within this passage is regularly translated to ‘abolition’ in English, yet Aufhebung in the context of Marx takes on multiple divergent yet coalescent meanings

Marx was namely concerned with expressing the true content of religion: suffering. Marx wanted society to address its true suffering, that which came from capitalism, and not

6Marx, K., O’Malley, J.J. and Jolin, A. (2009) ‘Introduction’, in Critique of Hegel’s ‘Philosophy of Right’ Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ‘Abolition’is used to translate Aufhebung in this publication.

7Blunden, A. (2000) ‘Aufheben’, Encyclopedia of Marxism. Available at: https://www.marxists.org/glossary/terms/a/u.htm (Accessed: 15 January 2024).

8Ibid.

9Blackburn, S. (2008) ‘Aufheben’, Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy. Available at: DOI: 10.1093/acref/9780199541430.001.0001 (Accessed: 15 January 2024).

10Cunningham, G. W. (1910) The Process of Thought: Mediation and Negation, Thought and Reality in Hegel’s System. Available at: https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/cunningham/thought-reality/ch02.htm (Accessed: 4 January 2024).

allow it to be merely numbed by religion. Marx did not want to abolish religion but transcend towards a society that formally addressed the root causes of its suffering and alienation while preserving the humanitarian qualities present in the true teachings of Christianity. Aufhebung was thus meant as negation of the exploitation and alienation within Capitalism that is ideologically consoled through religion, preservation of the valuable elements of religion that reject greed and hyper-individualism, the embrace of human co-operation and empathy, and transcendence of the conditions bred by Capitalism that give rise to religious illusions. 11

Aufhebung may have been frequently translated to ‘abolition’in Marx’s religion/opium passage due to modern-day negative connotations to opium itself, since if religion is the opium of the people, this may imply to some that religion is an addictive substance and followers of religion are addicts looking for their next hit. However, this was not the connotation of opium that people of the 19th century held. Attitudes to opiates are very different now than they were in 1843 when the original passage was written 12 Opium was seen as an important drug, one which could treat many physical and mental ailments of varying severity as opposed to our modern understanding of the drug’s negative effects on the lives of people through addiction and misuse.Andrew M. McKinnon illuminates:

Such was [opium’s] importance as a medicine that in the first years of the 19th century, people would have understood “opium of the people” as something we could translate into the twentieth idiom as “penicillin” of the people. By the end of the century [ ] opium was aggressively demonised. It’s between these two periods that Marx penned opium as his metaphor for religion.13

11Marx, K., O’Malley, J.J. and Jolin, A. (2009) ‘Introduction’, in Critique of Hegel’s ‘Philosophy of Right’. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

12Mckinnon, A.M. (2005) ‘Reading `Opium of the People’: Expression, Protest and the Dialectics of Religion’, Critical Sociology, 31(1–2), pp. 15–20. doi:10.1163/1569163053084360.

13Ibid., p. 17.

Opium was first and foremost just a medicine, therefore its use as simply a recreational drug for enjoyment or through addiction by some and its use as genuine medicine prescribed by doctors to ‘cure diseases’ were ‘indistinguishable’ during this time.14 McKinnon adds that ‘it was a source of enormous profit (which also provoked protest and rebellion)’15 , alluding to the profit made from opium rising alongside the worsening of working-class conditions with workers purchasing the drug from merchants to treat their own ailments from work-related injuries, sickness and mental stress. He closes, ‘finally, it was a source of ‘utopian’visions’16

Opium itself can offer a mental and physical escape for those living in the distress of poor working-class conditions. It can rose tint the framework of capitalism’s corruption. Likewise, religion has a real purpose in helping relieve the pain of survival labour in a capitalist society with the vision of utopia that is promised in the afterlife. Your suffering is acknowledged in church. You are told that the greedy are sinful, that those who are in control of the insurmountable and unachievable wealth will not get into Heaven, but you will. Your desire to outrage against the hierarchy is satiated because of the promise of utopia in the afterlife, and you can choose to be docile with these soporific effects, or you can choose to protest against the suffering you’re experiencing because you’ve been made aware that the vision of utopia may be attainable were you not living in these circumstances. The opioid effects of both the drug itself and religious teachings can offer the same conclusion en masse: you do not have to continue suffering this way.

'Abolishment' is commonly used to translate Aufhebung for the reasons outlined, suggesting a desire for the eradication of religion. However, interpreting Marx's juxtaposition of religion with suffering and the perception of the destructive effects of opiate addiction in the

14Ibid.

15Ibid., p. 18.

16Ibid.

modern context, it becomes evident that he did not advocate the complete abolition of religion Similarly, Piss Christ, which has often been perceived as calling for the destruction or desecration of Christianity, can be understood as a dynamic expression reflecting the evolving nature of Christianity and society, akin to the concept of Aufhebung in Marx's philosophy. Piss Christ involves a dialectical engagement, encompassing negation, preservation, and transcendence. Rather than a mere rejection of Christianity, this artwork aims to transform the discourse surrounding it similar to Marx with religion

Professor S. Brent Plate (Ph.D., M.Th ) adopts Walter Benjamin’s idea of a ‘constellation’17 from The Origins of German Tragic Drama to understand blasphemy:

It is a symbolic reference point made up of multiple, interconnecting points (stars). It’s a symbol that provides orientation. Just as ancient mariners navigated by the stars, constellations tell us where we are; astrologically speaking they also tell us who we are. The various stars that make up the constellation called blasphemy include idolatry, heresy, sacrilege, obscenity, infidelity, immorality, etc.18 Benjamin, in referencing historical materialism, was using constellations as a metaphor to challenge linear and teleological views of history. Plate is suggesting that acts of blasphemy, in challenging established beliefs, should be understood as points in a larger constellation of cultural dynamics. Art like Serrano’s challenges prevailing narratives, fostering stellar connections and the possibility of alternative perspectives.As historical materialism should not be understood as linear progression, but as a complex interplay of diverse moments and events, Piss Christ ought not to be understood in dichotomous thinking, but as a complex and dialectical interplay of elements that both defy Christian tradition and simultaneously progress it Using Benjamin’s passage, we can understand why Marx’s quote must be understood in the

17Benjamin, W. and Osborne, J. (1977) The Origin of German Tragic Drama. London: Verso, pp. 35–42

18Plate, S.B. (2006) Blasphemy:Art That Offends. London: Black Dog Publishing, p. 60.

historical context it was written within, paying mind to the vastly differing mindsets surrounding opium at this time, but it also illuminates why it’s important to understand the historical context preceding Piss Christ.

Historical Context

Before exploring the backlash towards Serrano’s work, I believe that briefly setting the historical context around modern art that has been demonised is necessary to understand the tone that was already set before Piss Christ was even created. Marx stated as follows:

Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living.19

Marx is acknowledging the interplay between human agency and historical circumstances within historical materialism, that the choices humans make are constrained by social and political conditions inheritedfrom thepast. Just ashistorical actorsdid not operatein avacuum, the varying reactions to Piss Christ do not exist in a vacuum either. ‘The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living’; the contemporary reception to Piss Christ is contingent also upon existing ideologies20 perpetuated by past generations. Thus, to fully comprehend the controversy surrounding artworks like that of Serrano’s, art that is deemed ‘blasphemous’ or otherwise ‘degenerate’, we must understand the historical materialisminherentinmodernartofthisnature.Theevents whichtookplacein Munich,1937,

19Marx, K. (1852) 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte. Marxists Internet Archive. Available at: https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1852/18th-brumaire/ch01.htm (Accessed: 15 January 2024).

20Felluga, D. (2002) ‘Modules on Marx: On Ideology’, Introductory Guide to Critical Theory. Available at: http://www.purdue.edu/guidetotheory/marxism/modules/marxideology.html (Accessed: 12 January 2024). ‘Ideology functions as the superstructure of a civilization: the conventions and culture that make up the dominant ideas of a society. The "ruling ideas" of a given epoch are, however, those of the ruling class […] Since one goal of ideology is to legitimize those forces in a position of hegemony, it tends to obfuscate the violence and exploitation that often keep a disempowered group in its place (from slaves in tribal society to the peasantry in feudal society to the proletariat in capitalist society).’

are important to draw attention to as the echoes of this time are carried on in modern perceptions to Piss Christ and works alike.

The most significant denunciation of modern art took place while the Nationalsozialistische DeutscheArbeiterpartei (NSDAP) were in power of Germany. Much of the artwork seized during this time was not physically destroyed; it was hung in an Entartete Kunst gallery, a Degenerate Art gallery. While the art was denounced and a curation of hatred targeted towards the modern artists was generated, particularly minority artists, it was necessary that the art was displayed.21 This was part of the fascist regime to generate disgust not towards just the minority artists in question, but towards the populations of Jewish, black, brown, and homosexual people as a whole. When artwork is not deemed culturally acceptable and does not assimilate into the culture’s mythos22, this work is deemed ‘bad’art, or not art at all 23 When individuals with a history of oppression or dissent against the dominant hegemony engage in artistic creation that deviates from contributing to the nation’s mythos, their art may be construed as an assault or challenge to the established hierarchical paradigm. ‘Degenerate art’served as a scapegoat for the Nazis to propagate their own ideology, creating national unity against perceived external threats: minorities. As the seized artworks went against the grain of culturally acceptable art of this time, and the public was not used to seeing this type of art, it was easy for the Nazis to ‘other’ it. The NSDAP’s objection to non-traditional art was an objection to non-traditional ways of being, i.e., being Jewish, black, or gay – being non-

21Levi, N. (1998) ‘“Judge for Yourselves!”-The “Degenerate Art” Exhibition as Political Spectacle’, MIT Press, 85, pp. 41–64. doi: 10.2307/779182.

22‘Mythos’, unlike ‘logos’ which refers to logical and rational analysis of phenomena, refers to cultural ideas which are subjective and based on individual experiences and feelings. To acquire knowledge through mythos is to rely on narrative and folk knowledge. In this case, the cultural mythos in question is one based on white supremacy, Nazism, and nationalism. The art celebrated by the NSDAP was ‘high art’ painted by white Old Masters with value based on its natural meritocracy (‘real art’) and artwork that resembled the post-colonial world in its subject matter, artwork that showed the ‘natural’ hierarchy of a white-centric world. Artwork that did not resemble this, therefore, would not contribute to the nation’s mythos.

23Jacob Geller (2019) Who’s Afraid of Modern Art: Video Games, Vandalism, and Fascism. [Online Video Essay] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5DqmTtCPiQ (Accessed: 28 December 2023).

Christian, and non-white Much of the art seized was from artists who were PoC, Jewish, or gay. That is to say, this ‘degeneracy’campaign was not only about the art itself. The NSDAP’s negation of modern art by seizing and displaying it for the sake of ridicule, mockery, and propaganda was part of ‘eugenics through the systemic devaluation of art’24 .

Reactions to Piss Christ

Since Piss Christ challengesnormsofculturallyacceptableart,itcanserveasapolitical tool. Those who gain influence from denouncing modern art like Piss Christ are those already in power, and more often than not, conservative right-wing Christians seeking influence over conservative voters. Denouncing controversial art like Piss Christ allowspoliticiansto position themselves as defenders of traditional values and religious sensibilities. Accusers of such ‘degeneracy’ or ‘blasphemy’ make it a duty to highlight the artworks they have deemed intolerable for cultural standards, similar to the Entartete Kunst gallery, to appeal to voters who may perceive art like Piss Christ as a threat to their traditions and beliefs. Drawing attention towards the art that they claim as ‘sacrilegious’is important, for the public must see the art to agree with its denouncers, and ultimately give their political support (perhaps through voting or donating to political campaigns) to the perceived ‘guardians’of traditional Christian values. Andres Serrano received a $15,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts25 (NEA) which sparked outrage and protests among conservative Christians, but only after Senators Jesse Helms and Al D’Amato rallied heavily for Piss Christ to be censored and defunded 26 The artwork had already quietly travelled through multiple exhibitions in various cities unscathed. Piss Christ only became a subject of interest for D’Amato and Helms through

24Ibid.

25Van Camp, J.C. (1997) Congressional Record (Senate - May 18, 1989), Comments on Andres Serrano by Members of the United States Senate.Available at: https://home.csulb.edu/~jvancamp/361_r7.html (Accessed: 04 January 2024).

26Ibid.

Reverand Donald E. Wildmon’s crusade against pornography and ‘anti-Christian bigotry’. Wildmon stated, ‘What we are up against is not dirty words and dirty pictures. It’s a philosophy of life which seeks to remove the influence of Christians and Christianity from our society.’27 This campaign, like the NSDAP’s Entartete Kunst, was also not only about the art.

In a short amount of time, Piss Christ became a controversial sensation, with Senator AlD’Amato and35ofhiscolleaguespressuringtheNEAtocutfundingtowards ‘blasphemous’ art.28 TheNEAand Congress debated about what kind ofartshouldbe funded with government money, and whether ‘offensive’or ‘blasphemous’ art like Serrano’s should be included in this funding. Former NEA chairman, Livingston Biddle, stated, ‘I do think there is a clear distinction between freedom of expression as a concept, which is something I would defend forever, and the limit or license to use the taxpayers' money in a way that may be totally objectionable to a great many people.’29 The funding, which made up only 0.004%30 of the federal budget, was successfully cut on the back of Helms.

To this day, Piss Christ is still a topic of protest, with one protestor stating in 2017 that the reason Piss Christ is free game for public display despite its offensive religious imagery is because ‘we are living in an age where it’s ‘open season’on Christianity’31 and that if another

27Selcraig, B. (1990) ‘Reverend Wildmon’s War on The Arts’, The New York Times. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/1990/09/02/magazine/reverend-wildmons-war-on-the-arts.html (Accessed: 15 January 2024).

28Van Camp, J.C. (1997) Congressional Record (Senate - May 18, 1989), Comments on Andres Serrano by Members of the United States Senate.Available at: https://home.csulb.edu/~jvancamp/361_r7.html (Accessed: 04 January 2024).

29Kastor, E. (1989) ‘Funding Art That Offends’, The Washington Post. Available at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1989/06/07/funding-art-that-offends/a8b0755f-fab9-4f7fa8ef-2ccad7048fe2/ (Accessed: 15 January 2024).

30National Endowment for the Arts (2016) ‘National Endowment for the Arts – Quick Facts’. Available at: https://www.arts.gov/sites/default/files/NEA_Quick_Facts_2018_V.1.pdf (Accessed: 04 January 2024).

31Glasstire (2017) ‘Protestors Gathered Yesterday Against the Station Museum’s Andres Serrano Exhibition’Available at: https://glasstire.com/2017/06/25/protestors-gathered-yesterday-against-the-stationmuseums-andres-serrano-exhibition/ (Accessed: 13 January 2024).

religion’s sacred symbols were used it would be considered hate speech. This is a sentiment used also in academic oppositions to Piss Christ, with Fisher and Ramsay stating, ‘we might consider how we would respond to […] the superimposition of a swastika over a Star of David.’32 What is sobering about this statement, however, is that in 2017 when this particular Piss Christ protest was taking place, there was a boom in Ku Klux Klan memberships, organisations which are inextricably linked with Protestant Christianity and Nationalism33 , with 42 different Klan organisations active in 22 US states34 as of June 2017. There are numerous Neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups active in the USA that inflict genuine material consequences on racial, gender, and sexual minorities that are not merely limited to the desecration of the Star of David. Morgan Richards states:

The subjective politics of offence allows those who take exception to a work of art to position themselves as a demeaned and violated group – even when this group draws its numbers from the empowered ranks of the roman catholic church. Intolerance plays acrosstheSerrano camp, just as it’s manifestedin theconservativeand largely Christian opposition to their work.35

To position Christians as a ‘demeaned and violated group’due to Serrano’s desecration of the cross overlooks the fact that Christians have the judicial power to desecrate their own sacred symbolism to demean and violate the humanity of others. The most prominent example of this is the Ku Klux Klan’s burning of crucifixes, which is frequently used as an intimidation tactic

32Fisher, A., and Ramsay, H. (2000) ‘Of Art and Blasphemy’, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 3(2), p. 142. http://www.jstor.org/stable/27504129

33Stephens, R. (2017) ‘The Klan, White Christianity, and the Past and Present: A Response to Kelly J. Baker’, University of Chicago. https://voices.uchicago.edu/religionculture/2017/06/26/the-klan-white-christianity-andthe-past-and-present-a-response-to-kelly-j-baker-by-randall-j-stephens/ (Accessed: 14 January 2024).

34Anti-Defamation League (2017) ‘Despite Internal Turmoil, Klan Groups Persist’. Available at: https://www.adl.org/sites/default/files/documents/CR_5173_Klan%20Report_vFFF2.pdf (Accessed: 04 January 2024).

35Richards, M. (1999) ‘Taking The Piss: From Serrano To Surfwear’, Media InternationalAustralia, 92(1), p. 34. doi:10.1177/1329878x9909200106.

againstracialminorities andJewishpeople36 ,beingdefendedunderAmerican freespeechlaws. The desecration of the crucifix as an ‘expressive activity’37 is protected by the First Amendment, meaning Christian groups have the power to desecrate the crucifix in ways that blatantly oppose Christ’s teachings38 in the name of freedom of expression. A member of the KKK, Barry Black, was arrested for cross-burning, but since the intention to intimidate could not be proven, he could not be convicted of any crime39 despite his role as a Klansman. This means that the crucifix as a sacred symbol in Christianity can be desecrated by some Christians when it’s used to express an ideology of alt-right hatred, so long as the intention cannot be proven as a means to incite violence towards African Americans and Jews.40 Groups of Christians, albeit a small number of them, desecrate their own religious symbols in promotion of ideologies that are not Christ-like in nature. This type of subversion of religious imagery is a perversion of Christianity and could not be considered an Aufhebung like Serrano’s work as it completely negates Christ’s teachings. The dominant religion has sects like this which are constitutionally protected, and yet, there are protestors against Serrano’s work who believe his ability to ‘get away with it’is due to this perceived ‘open season’on Christianity, for as Julian

36 Stephens, R. (2017) ‘The Klan, White Christianity, and the Past and Present: A Response to Kelly J. Baker’, University of Chicago https://voices.uchicago.edu/religionculture/2017/06/26/the-klan-white-christianity-andthe-past-and-present-a-response-to-kelly-j-baker-by-randall-j-stephens/ (Accessed: 14 January 2024).

37Bell, J. (2004) ‘O Say, Can You See: Free Expression by the Light of Fiery Crosses’, Harvard Civil Rights-Civil LibertiesLawReview, 39.Available at: https://www.repository.law.indiana.edu/facpub/334(Accessed: 04 January 2024).

38The Holy Bible. John. 4:20. King James Version. ‘If a man say, I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?’

39Virginia v. Black (2003) U.S. Supreme Court Center. Available at: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/538/343/#tab-opinion-1961221 (Accessed: 13 January 2024).

40Burning Cross (2022) Anti-Defamation League. Available at: https://www.adl.org/resources/hatesymbol/burning-cross (Accessed: 07 January 2024). This question of ‘intention’is precarious, since the ‘image of the burning cross is one of the most potent hate symbols in the United States, popularised as a terror image by the Ku Klux Klan.’

Bond puts it, ‘For many years the KKK quite literally could get away with murder.’41 The subversion of Christian imagery does not have material consequences for Christians themselves, but through the burning of crosses, it does for minorities. Both Serrano and the KKK can be perceived as doing the same thing in their subversion of Christian symbols, but one challenges beliefs surrounding artistic expression and may cause offense to some, while the other causes direct material harm to marginalised communities.42

Preservation and Negation

The crucifix, traditionally viewed by Christians as a symbol of reverence and sanctity, now finds itself submerged in a profane baptism of Serrano’s urine. The artwork becomes a negation through Serrano’s subversion of traditional religious imagery, challenging established religious representations. Serrano is subverting the script with the Christian public, for they accuse him of sacrilege while he is pointing the finger at them for the same thing. Serrano believes the crucifix should be treated with reverence due to the magnitude of suffering that Christ endured during the crucifixion, but he is expressing that this is not the case; the crucifix is being commodified and marketed as a fetish43 object, and people are consuming Christ’s image instead of his teachings. Serrano’s work is not merely a blasphemous experience, but a commentary on how Christ’s teachings are being desecrated by capitalism. The piece is a

41Bond, J. (2011) ‘Ku Klux Klan: A History of Racism’, Southern Poverty Law Center, p. 5. Available at: https://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/Ku-Klux-Klan-A-History-of-Racism.pdf (Accessed: 13 January 2024).

42Dees, M. (2011) ‘Ku Klux Klan: A History of Racism’, Southern Poverty Law Center, pp. 52-54. Available at: https://www.splcenter.org/sites/default/files/Ku-Klux-Klan-A-History-of-Racism.pdf (Accessed: 13 January 2024).

43Buchanan, I. (2010) ‘Commodity Fetishism’, in A Dictionary of Critical Theory. Oxford University Press, p. 278.‘It isn’t clear to the people who believe in commodities why they should believe in them, nor how they came to occupy the position they presently enjoy.’In this case, I refer to the crucifix as a fetish object to help illuminate Serrano’s position, which is that Christians (and the Church) have lost touch with the crucifix’s original meaning, using the crucifix to virtue signal or misuse Christ’s teachings. Serrano believes that the crucifix has become merely a commodity and is not revered the way it should be. occupy the position they presently enjoy.

depiction of suffering that attempts to bring us closer to Christ, and it requires some contemplation thatstretches beyondtheinitialgasps ofoffence WalterBenjamin stated, ‘There is no document of civilisation which is not at the same time a document of barbarism’44 , and I believe this echoes Serrano’s statement about his own work, in which he outlines his reasons for creating Piss Christ were in order to depict what the crucifixion actually looked like45 and what it represented (suffering and barbarism at the hands of the Romans), not the sanitised version that he saw being marketed by the culture industry.

Serrano stated that Piss Christ was a criticism of the ‘billion-dollar Christ-for-profit industry’46 and a ‘condemnation of those who abuse the teachings of Christ for their own ignoble ends’47 . Serrano’s work combines the suffering of Christ with the suffering of the people, and through the use of the plastic cross, most likely produced in a Chinese factory by an underpaid female worker48 , Serrano displays an emblematic symbol of working-class suffering. Regardless of what religion someone practices, suffering, and especially suffering under Capitalism, can be understood and related to by all due to how invasive Capitalism is within people’s lives and how it stretches between continents due to colonialism. Perhaps some

44Benjamin, W. (1969) ‘Theses on the Philosophy of History’, in Illuminations. Schocken Books, p. 256.

45Explored on p. 17.

46Chrisafa, A. (2011) ‘Attack on “Blasphemous” Art Work Fires Debate on Role of Religion in France’, The Guardian, 18 April. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/apr/18/andres-serrano-piss-christdestroyed-christian-protesters (Accessed: 13 January 2024).

47Ibid.

48Kernaghan, C. (2007) ‘Workers Bear the Cross: Retailers, Churches Accused of Selling Sweatshop-Made Crucifixes’. Interviewed by Amy Goodman. Democracy Now. 21st November. Available at: https://www.democracynow.org/2007/11/21/workers_bear_the_cross_retailers_churches (Accessed: 12 January 2024). Executive Director of the National Labor Committee, Charles Kernaghan, discusses the NLC’s report on the mass production of crucifixes in dire sweatshops. Goodman summarises, ‘The National Labor Committee accuses US-based Christian retailers and churches of selling crucifixes made under sweatshop conditions in China […] the crucifixes were made by young women working fourteen- to twenty-five-hour shifts for less than half of China’s legal minimum wage. The report implicates the New York City-based St. Patrick’s Cathedral, as well as Trinity Church, and at the national level, the $4.63 billion Association for Christian Retail.’ Kernaghan tells us none of the crucifixes produced had their true origin marked on the product, with some consumers believing their crucifixes were produced in Italy.

of the shock for Piss Christ came from a place of confrontation with the true nature of its meaning (Christ’s greatest sacrifice), which was forgotten through the fetishism of the crucifix as merely something to purchase.

When Jesus Christ was nailed to the cross for six hours, Serrano says that it would not be far-fetched to assume he spent those hours urinating on himself, potentially defecating himself, as he starved and dehydrated, and was eventually asphyxiated to death from the entire weight of his body hanging on only his arms.49 This is the Passion of the Christ. This is the suffering he endured towards his death before his resurrection. It was grotesque, with urine, with deep lacerations inflicting his flesh and creating wounds inflicted with dirt, blood, and sweat. Christ’s flesh at the hands of the Romans was more deformed than one could potentially imagine, than one could ever replicate just through submerging a mimetic50 commodity in urine. Serrano challenges the commodification and desensitisation of sacred symbols through this process. As the Passover lambs were slaughtered and Christ encountered his final release from life on earth at the 6th hour, one could imagine an atmosphere adjacent to that depicted in Piss Christ; a metaphysical, eerie red glow like Serrano’s red-tinged photograph. There is an uncomfortable intensity and disquieting beauty, a symbol of redemption marred by a medium that suggests desecration.This is an obvious symbolic depiction of what Christ suffered; Christ was desecrated, but he was also metaphorically ‘pissed’ on. Serrano’s work was not vilified because Piss Christ depicted suffering, for even in the shiniest of crucifixion commodities, therestillexiststhedepictionofamanwhowastorturedtodeath.Hisworkwasvilified because

49Okafor, U. (2014) ‘Exclusive Interview With Andres Serrano, Photographer of “Piss Christ”’, HuffPost Available at: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/exclusive-interview-with_b_5442141(Accessed: 04 January2024). Serrano states, ‘The crucifix is a symbol that has lost its true meaning; the horror of what occurred. It represents the crucifixion of a man who was tortured, humiliated and left to die on a cross for several hours. In that time, Christ not only bled to dead, he probably saw all his bodily functions and fluids come out of him.’

50Just as the mass-produced crucifix that Serrano used is a fetish object, it is also mimetic, for the crucifix is not Christ himself, but a synthetic depiction of him.

many of us in the West have become desensitised to the true violence of Christ’s crucifixion, just as we have become alienated from the true nature of death 51 Serrano believes that Christ’s suffering has been sanitised through its modern commodification without the bodily fluids and oozing wounds, although earlier depictions of Christ usually showed the true horrors that took place and were not viewed as shocking.52 Serrano’s work does not intend to shock, and in the same light as sacred religious jewellery or Church wall-hangings, Piss Christ does not desecrate Christ’s death, but ‘resacralises’53 it. Through the framework of Aufhebung, we can see that the piece is dialectical in its use of bodily fluids and its atmosphere of deep cadmium and rich golden light which seems to symbolise his resurrection. There is beauty in Piss Christ which could be compared to the gold necklaces many Christians wear around their necks that depict both Christ’s suffering and resurrection through the symbolic juxtaposition of the suffering (crucifixion) and the glimmering, reflective light of the metal. Serrano explains that ‘if Piss Christ upsets people, maybe this is so because it’s bringing the symbol [of crucifixion]

51Sosler, A. (2022) ‘Going to the Morgue with Andres Serrano: Provocation as Revelation’. Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute. Available at: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/13/6/562 (Accessed: 14 January 2024). ‘This medicalized view of death sequesters the reality of death out of view.As a matter of statistics, death has become sterilized behind the closed doors of hospitals. In the 1940s, most people died in their homes in the presence of loved ones and family. In the 1980s, 17 percent of people died in their homes (Gawande 2017, p. 6). Infant mortality rates were much higher. Graveyards were near city centers. But today, it is easier to avoid death than in previous generations. Death, a fate inevitable in previous generations, is seen as unnatural to life. Death is something not to reckon with but to push further out of the bounds of one’s mind.’

52Jones, J. (2017) ‘Crucifixion is Horribly Violent – We Must Confront its Reality Head On’, The Guardian Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/jonathanjonesblog/2017/jan/05/crucifixion-glasgowtheology-students-violent-brutal-images-death-paintings (Accessed: 14 January 2024). ‘When artists 500 years ago depicted the crucifixion they were not showing a totally unfamiliar sight. People were still executed and left to rot in public, just as they had been in ancient Roman times. Death was ever present. It still is, of course, in cells and war zones. But we in wealthy peaceful countries don’t usually see death on the street. We can turn our eyes away more easily from suffering. That is why we need art’s tormenting images of the crucifixion – to make us see what we would rather ignore.’

53Sosler, A. (2022) ‘Going to the Morgue with Andres Serrano: Provocation as Revelation’, Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute. Available at: https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/13/6/562 (Accessed: 14 January 2024). ‘One could argue that Serrano is not provoking for no purpose; rather, he shocks the viewer to see the truth. Perhaps Serrano is not desecrating death but resacralizing death.’

closer to its original meaning.’54 Serrano brings forth the true image of the crucifixion with the inclusion of bodily fluids, the ‘original meaning’ in question being Christ’s Passion which he endured for us and its juxtaposition of the profane and sacred – the beauty within the love that Christ showed for us through his greatest sacrifice, and the transcendence that came after it with his resurrection.

Understanding Piss Christ as profane as well as sacred does not necessarily mean that the artwork is a desecration of Christ and may help us further negate the ‘blasphemous’aspect in orderto see thework as an Aufhebung.GiorgioAgambenexplores thesacred andtheprofane in-depth; he states that ‘profane is the term for something that was once sacred or religious and is returned to the use and property of men’55 and that ‘religio is not what unites men and Gods but what ensures they remain distinct’

56 . Since the crucifix submerged in Serrano’s urine is a synthetic consumer object, this means it’s not from the same substance as Jesus Christ or God, but rather it is a reproduced image of the idea of Christ’s crucifixion (mimetic commodity) using both finite and synthetic materials. If we are to use Agamben’s above definition of profane, one could say that the crucifix itself that Serrano used was already profane regardless of what backdrop or situation within which it was placed since the ethos and symbolism of the object was one that was sacred, and yet the object itself is not sacred due to its use and property of men. Morgan Richards, under the influence ofAmeliaArenas, elucidates this notion, stating that ‘Serrano does not immerse Christ in urine, but his mimetic symbol. He reduces the historical mocking of Christ to the act of despoiling his image.’57 It is the representation of

54Okafor, U. (2014) ‘Exclusive Interview With Andres Serrano, Photographer of “Piss Christ”’, HuffPost. Available at: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/exclusive-interview-with_b_5442141(Accessed: 04 January2024).

55Agamben, G. (2010) Profanations. New York: Zone Books, p. 73.

56Ibid., p. 75.

57Richards, M. (1999) ‘Taking the Piss: From Serrano to Surfwear’, Media InternationalAustralia, 92(1), pp. 33–42. doi: 10.1177/1329878x9909200106.

Christ that could be viewed as ‘blasphemed’, but not the actual life that Christ lived nor a desecration of Christ himself Agamben offers an interesting analysis of blaspheming the ‘image’of God, stating that only the name of God can be blasphemed or profaned. This would imply the image of God (in this case, the mimetic commodity) cannot be blasphemed, since ‘all that God possesses is his name’58 . Thus, Serrano’s crucifix does not have the capacity to be blasphemed since it is not God, nor is it in the possession of God.

‘Profane’ has two meanings in Latin: (i) to render profane and (ii) to sacrifice (‘consecrated to the Gods’, ‘cursed and excluded from community’).59 Like Marx associates suffering under Capitalism with religious suffering, Agamben reveals that Capitalism is ‘a religious phenomenon which develops parasitically from Christianity’60 . Capitalism is coined amodern religion byAgamben,that ‘everything has meaning only inreferenceto thefulfilment of a cult’61 and that Capitalism as religion will not enable a transformation of our world, but an abolition of it.62 Capitalism challenges Christian ethos in its creation of insufferable working conditionstopummelmass-producedobjects,includingChristianiconographylikethatpresent in Serrano’s work. The ethics practiced and preached by Christ himself are excreted like waste through capitalism’s apparatus and metaphysically desecrated by those who claim to preach his word The reproduction of the crucifix itself does not have the agency to be sacred due to the capitalistic nature of its origins in consumerism as a ‘profane’material. Additionally, the irony of microplastics infiltrating the urine within Piss Christ is not lost on me, and it can also

58Agamben, G. (2010) The Sacrament of Language. Cambridge: Polity Press, p. 40.

59Agamben, G. (2010) Profanations. New York: Zone Books, p. 77.

60Ibid., p. 80.

61Ibid.

62Ibid.

function as a subtle metaphor for the destruction caused by ‘Capitalism as a religion’, both on the planet and the human body

Urine, in Serrano’s case, has been viewed as something that can desecrate the sacred by protestors, but using Agamben’s further analysis of ‘profane’ in which he describes ‘profane’ assimply‘non-sacred’63,wecanbetterunderstandtheuseofurineinSerrano’swork.Agamben reminds us that while the Sabbath is sacred, the profane is simply every other day of the week.

This is apt for looking at Serrano’s work, we can understand urine as something that is indeed profane, but not necessarily sacrilegious or offensive. However, since urine comes from the same organ that contributes to procreation and the emergence of life in the form of insemination, this organ thus has the potential to be viewed simultaneously as both sacred and profane. Hegel states:

The depth which the Spirit brings forth from within but only as far as its picturethinking consciousness where it lets it remain and the ignorance of this consciousness about what it really is saying, are the same conjunction of the high and the low which, in the living being, Nature naïvely expresses when it combines the organ of its highest fulfilment, the organ of generation, with the organ of urination. The infinite judgement, qua infinite, would be the fulfilment of life that comprehends itself; the consciousness of the infinite judgement that remains at the level of picture-thinking behaves as urination.64

Hegel draws parallels between the workings of the mind and the organic composition of living beings; the Spirit is a metaphorical representation of the internal cognitive faculty responsible for introspection and comprehension. The notion of picture-thinking consciousness refers to a cognitive state wherein understanding is mediated through mental images. Hegel proposes an interplay between profound comprehension on a metaphysical level and a more superficial,

63Ibid., pp. 73–80.

64Hegel, G.W.F. (1977) Phenomenology of Spirit. Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 210.

image-based mode of understanding. His analogy combines the organs of generation and urination in living beings; the conjunction of the high (the depth of the Spirit) and the low (the image-based consciousness). This juxtaposition implies a unity of seemingly contradictory elements, akin to Serrano’s work. Hegel introduces the concept of the ‘infinite judgement’ as an all-encompassing and comprehensive grasp of life that comprehends itself and its most intimate functions, transcending the limitations of mere picture-thinking consciousness. However, Hegel’s argument lies in the observation that the Spirit sometimes remains at the level of picture-thinking.65

To analogise Hegel’s quote with urination underscores that, in such instances, comprehension falls short of its potential for intimate and complex comprehension. Simply, if the mind were to comprehend the great complexities of the body’s elaborate procedure of urination and bladder function in order to urinate, urination would likely be impossible Like Agamben’s illustration of his concept Genius, in which he states that urine and blood are both ingenious – things which are so intimate to us likeurinating and sleeping are ingenious because they have no distance from us and are yet deeply impersonal and alien, only becoming personal to us when there is a problem like insomnia or nocturia.66 The mundanity of urination only becomes something other than mundane when the inner bodily functions for the act begin to fail, or in Serrano’s case, the regular mundanity of urine becomes a stimulant for outrage and passionwhenit’sjuxtaposedwithsymbolsofthesacred.Throughdialectics around Piss Christ, urine’s status of profane moves from the status of non-sacred, to anti-sacred and sacrilegious.

Theabilityto createlifeis asacredfunction,thereforethereproductiveorgan’s adjacent function of urination is just one side of the same coin. Jesus Christ was just as profane as we

65Ibid.

66Agamben, G. (2010) Profanations. New York: Zone Books, pp. 9–13.

are in his corporeal humanity, but despite this, he emerged from the same substance as God and was no less sacred, even in his profane functions that are only human. Christ was profane and sacred in coalescence. This indeed could be analogised with the functions of the sex organs/instruments, the penis in this instance, which brings forth sanctity in life, but also eliminates toxins from the blood through urination. Since urination comes from the same substance as generative power and reproduction, there is a grey area in urine’s status as nonsacred As Agamben shows that profane does not equate to sacrilegious, but merely to nonsacred, the profanation of urine need not be considered something taboo or beyond the limits of godliness. Urine in juxtaposition with Christ need not be considered blasphemous when approaching the artwork within the framework of Aufhebung

Christ was crucified, then we crucified him again by taking his greatest suffering (The Passion of Christ) and sanitising it.We sterilised the meaning of the horrors that Christ endured on the crucifix. I use the world ‘sterilised’ meaningfully here and would like to explore this further without merely speculating, but rather, offering another possible perspective on the use of urine. It is known that Serrano has also used blood and semen67 in his works, and of course, if semen were the bodily fluid of choice in place of urine within Piss Christ, that would transform its meaning in various ways, namely, it would negate the notion of ‘sterilisation’. It is clear that Serrano was not merely looking to use just any profane bodily fluid It is precisely the use of urine, and the fact it is part of the duality of the penis alongside ejaculation (juxtaposingHegel’s‘high’(thedepth oftheSpirit)and‘low’(theimage-basedconsciousness)) that can draw light on the sterilisation of Christ’s suffering that has taken place under capitalism. This appears to me as a nuanced depiction of the sterilisation of Christ’s Passion in

67Serrano, A. (2022) ‘Bodily Fluids’, Andres Serrano. Available at: https://andresserrano.org/series/bodily-fluids (Accessed: 14 January 2024).

Western society, while functioning as an image that further soils the image of the crucifixion to bring observers closer to the true nature of Christ’s suffering.

Academic Oppositions to Piss Christ

The question of whether it’s ethical to display Piss Christ regardless of an objective status of ‘blasphemous’ being established has been questioned in academia, namely, in Of Art and Blasphemy by Anthony Fisher and Hayden Ramsay. I will be analysing this piece to consider whether the arguments offered by the authors could negate the work’s status of an Aufhebung of Christianity which I propose, as opposed to a negation of Christianity and its morals. Since the argument is made that Piss Christ ought not to be shown to the public due to its ‘blasphemous’nature and being considered deeply offensive on an ethical and moral level, this would give no room for the work to reach the status of an Aufhebung of Christianity since the transcendence aspect of Aufhebung requires the work to be displayed to the public. Piss Christ can only reach transcendence when the work has the opportunity to unite viewers in a mutual cognisance of Christ’s suffering and the suffering of humanity Serrano’s work is ultimately cast aside as Fisher and Ramsay conclude that showing Piss Christ is ‘a public […] moral offence’

68 .

Fisher and Ramsay state, ‘Popular repugnance at sacrilege and blasphemy would seem to be an example of [profound offence].As with incest, bestiality, cannibalism […] desecration of corpses, we are repelled ‘because we intuit and feel, immediately and without argument, the violation of things that we rightfully hold dear.’’

69 I argue that this comparison in itself is not a fair assessment due to the wider context that it’s situated in, which is the matter of religious

68Fisher, A., and Ramsay, H. (2000) ‘Of Art and Blasphemy’, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 3(2), pp. 137–167. http://www.jstor.org/stable/27504129

69Ibid, p. 143.

offence. The authors use Joel Feinberg’s terminology of ‘profound offence’ to illustrate Piss Christ, though in the same work cited by the authors, Feinberg offers the category of ‘disgust and revulsion’ to include matters such as cannibalism, as well as a category that he names ‘shock to moral, religious, or patriotic sensibilities’70 . This would be a better fit to categorise the outrage caused by Serrano’s photograph. Unlike desecration of a corpse which has material effects on the corpse itself71 in the desecration of their dignity, something like a flag can only be desecrated insofar as one believes the flag to be sacred. A flag, unlike a person, requires a certain belief to be perceived as sacred, but the human body ought not be violated regardless of one’s beliefs due to bodily autonomy.72 Aflag or a crucifix has no agency nor autonomy, but the human who perceives the objects has the agency to determine how they engage with the objects that cause their repulsion.

If the ‘violation’felt by perceiving the image was from the same place as that felt from true moral wrongdoings (e.g. taking someone’s life) and was as ‘objectively serious as violence against persons’73 , I question why Serrano, as well as employees from museums displaying his work, received such a magnitude of death threats from Christians.74 The disgust felt from murder, thus desecration of a person’s body, surely cannot be akin to the anger felt from perceived offensiveness to a belief that has been cultivated through exposure to and teachings

70Feinberg, J. (2006) 'Offensive Nuisances', The Moral Limits of the Criminal Law: Volume 2: Offense to Others, New York: OxfordAcademic. doi: 10.1093/0195052153.003.0001

71Young, C., & Light, D. (2013) ‘Corpses, Dead Body Politics and Agency in Human Geography: Following the Corpse of Dr Petru Groza’, Transactions of theInstitute of British Geographers, 38(1), pp. 135–148.Available at: http://www.jstor.org/stable/24582446 (Accessed: 12 January 2024).

72Ibid.

73Fisher, A., and Ramsay, H. (2000) ‘Of Art and Blasphemy’, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 3(2), p. 144. http://www.jstor.org/stable/27504129

74Fusco, C. (1991) ‘Shooting the Klan: An Interview with Andres Serrano’, Community Arts Network, High Performance Magazine.Available at: https://shorturl.at/rsBGR

from a religious organisation or the ethos of patriotism from certain politicians 75 Fisher and Ramsayproposethat weintuit thewrong ofcannibalism dueto aninnateresponse,andwhether that is true or not, it is not an innate response to feel natural reverence for a crucifix as this is something that is taught through a doctrine. Fisher and Ramsay state: It was so hurtful to Christians: this was their God, their sovereign Lord […] whom they sawbeing trivialisedand insultedinthenameofart.Evenifoneconsideredthemwrong to think this, only someone lacking all moral imagination and sympathy could fail to foresee the pain and outrage that would be associated with such (perceived) blasphemy.76

Christians who felt offence to the point of calling for the artist’s own desecration through violent death are robbed of their own agency when opposers of the work imply that their reactions were expected or justified In reference to the statement, ‘if someone killed [Andres Serrano] […] would you say that if [Andres Serrano] was killed by a Christian that he brought it on himself?’, Bill Donohue, President of the Catholic League in the United States, said that if Serrano ‘exercised restraint he wouldn’t be dead’77 With this sentiment, it could also be implied that if Christ had exercised restraint with his own ‘act of blasphemy’ (claiming to be King of the Jews), he would not have been crucified. This sentiment places blame on victims and implies that if someone were to attack Serrano, it’s simply a case of ‘play stupid games, win stupid prizes’. When Piss Christ was vandalised78 by Christians in Southern France, it was not the photograph that caused this attack, but the agency of the vandals. Fisher and Ramsay’s

75McTernan, E. (2021) ‘Taking Offense:An Emotion Reconsidered’, Philosophy&PublicAffairs, 49(2), pp. 179–208. doi:10.1111/papa.12188.

76Fisher, A., and Ramsay, H. (2000) ‘Of Art and Blasphemy’, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice, 3(2), p. 141. http://www.jstor.org/stable/27504129

77Mantyla, K. (2015) ‘Donohue: If Someone Kills ‘Piss Christ’Artist, It Will Be The Artist’s Own Fault’, Right Wing Watch. Available at: https://www.rightwingwatch.org/post/donohue-if-someone-kills-piss-christ-artist-itwill-be-the-artists-own-fault/ (Accessed: 14 January 2024).

78Chrisafa, A. (2011) ‘Serrano Piss Christ Slashed’, The Sydney Morning Herald. Available at: https://www.smh.com.au/world/serrano-piss-christ-slashed-20110419-1dnd6.html (Accessed: 16 January 2024)

proposal of ‘gut-level outrage’ towards Piss Christ is emblematic of the notion that the popularised idea of the crucifix being traditionally (or somehow transcendentally) revered is more often than not an illusory idea79 that certain Christians hold. It is not an innate response to be outraged at Serrano’s use of the crucifix as any response is based on personal religious sensibilities. One can revere Christ without revering the commodified crucifix and vice versa, which is what Serrano was trying to say: Christ is not being treated with reverence because we are too busy revering only the commodified mimetic symbol of his crucifixion

Some of those who showed offence at Serrano’s work had stated that it was, in fact, the title and not the subject matter itself that provoked such offence. For some, the use of urine was offensive in and of itself, to Christians and non-Christians alike, showing that 'piss is offensive, with or without Christ.’80 The urine itself could be viewed as offensive under Mary Douglas’ ‘pollution taboos’81 , being that Piss Christ violates ‘society’s set of beliefs, rituals, and practices having to do with dirt, order and hygiene’82 since ‘the sight of bodily fluid is disturbing because it threatens the myth of our own corporeal stability’83 . Despite its taboo nature, urine itself has its place within the Holy Bible and itself has been compared to a symbol of peace, the Spirit, and prosperity by Christ himself. Christ regularly used material things to illustrate spiritual teachings, and urine was one of them. In John 7:38, Jesus states, ‘He that

79Smith, G., Rotolo, M., Tevington, P. (2022) ‘Views of the U.S. as a ‘Christian nation’ and Opinions About ‘Christian nationalism’’, Pew Research Center’s Religion & Public Life Project. Available at: https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2022/10/27/views-of-the-u-s-as-a-christian-nation-and-opinions-aboutchristian-nationalism/ (Accessed: 13 January 2024) Since the U.S. is a secular nation, religious pluralism exists, but ‘most Americans think the founders of America intended for the U.S. to be a Christian Nation’, meaning the idea that Christian symbolism (especially the crucifix) should naturally be treated with reverence by citizens within the U.S. is an illusory idea that is based on the misinterpretation of the nation’s religious status.

80Richards, M. (1999) ‘Taking The Piss: From Serrano To Surfwear’, Media InternationalAustralia, 92(1), p. 37. doi:10.1177/1329878x9909200106.

81Ibid.

82Ibid.

83Ibid.

believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.’84 Living water, in this case, signifies the Holy Spirit, but here Jesus compares it to urine physically flowing from the belly; just as urine has an important role in healing the body’s life source by cleansing the blood, the Holy Spirit can also play a role in healing and cleansing the soul. Here we can see that urine has the potential to be compared to sacred things, or at least to materially illustrate them in some way

Within the Bible, urine has also been used as a concept to humiliate, which we can see with 2 Kings 18:27: ‘Rabshakeh said unto them, Hath my master sent me to thy master, and to thee, to speak these words? Hath he not sent me to the men which sit on the wall, that they may eat their own dung, and drink their own piss with you?’85 In this passage, Rabshakeh of King Sennacherib is insulting the followers of Christ, the Jewish people, by vulgarly telling them that in their following of Christ they are eaters of faeces and drinkers of ‘piss’ Urine can be used as both a negation and preservation of scripture depending on the intention behind its use Like most things within the Bible, there exists plurality depending on the context within which it is used. We know that Rabshakeh was demeaning and intended to humiliate due to our knowledge of his place within the Bible’s stories, but his statement may have read differently if he were a follower of Christ. If the context were different, this statement could be interpreted as saying that the followers of Christ are so strong in their faith that they will participate in even the ‘lowest’ actions of life to become more like the divine, since it’s known Jesus frequently engaged with, what was interpreted at that time as, the ‘lowest’of life (the diseased, the sick, the ostracised). Despite varying translations of the word across different publications

84The Holy Bible. John. 7:38. King James Version (2011). Michigan: Zondervan Grand Rapids.

85The Holy Bible. 2 Kings. 18:27. King James Version (2011). Michigan: Zondervan Grand Rapids.

of the Bible, the context within which ‘piss’ is used remains the same: the cursing of males. The word ‘piss’in Biblical times, however, is inoffensive by itself.

Most modern English translations of the Holy Bible use ‘urine’ or ‘male’ in place of ‘piss’ or ‘pisseth’86 , however, the King James Version (KJV) preserves the original use of the word ‘piss’so I will be focusing mainly on this edition to explore the use of this word ‘Piss’is used in the HolyBible atotalof eight times87 ,six of thesetimes appearing in theaccompanying statement of ‘pisseth against the wall’. Despite ‘piss’ being described as ‘a totemic word, a symbol of defilement’, the word itself is actually much older than the word ‘urine’and by itself had no vulgar connotations in Biblical times.As we will see, ‘pisseth against the wall’has been translated to simply ‘male’in the New InternationalVersion (NIV), though the original Hebrew hasbeenpreservedin theKJV,where‘pisseth’and ‘piss’stillrefertotheiroriginalconnotations with urination In 2 Kings 9:8 (KJV), God states, ‘The whole house of Ahab shall perish: and I will cut off fromAhab him that pisseth against the wall’88, while in the NIV, it’s translated as ‘I will cut off fromAhab every last male89 in Israel’90 .Regardless of the translation of ‘pisseth’, the original version of ‘urine’ which was spoken by God, the phrase entails the slaughtering and cursing of all males in a particular group. The original Hebrew word is ןַתָׁש (šātan)91 which translates literally to ‘urinate’, ‘one who urinates’, or causatively ‘to make water’ ‘Piss’ is

86Some examples of Holy Bible publications that use ‘urine’instead of ‘piss’: NIV, NLT, ESV, BSB, NASB, LSB, CSB, HCSB,ASV, NRSV

87‘Pisseth in the KJV Bible’, King James Bible Online. (Available at: https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/search.php?q=Pisseth (Accessed: 12 January2024). ‘1 Kings14:10, 16:11, 21:21, 1 Samuel 25:22, 25:34, 2 Kings 9:8, 18:27, Isaiah 36:12.’

88The Holy Bible. 2 Kings. 9:8. King James Version. Michigan: Zondervan Grand Rapids.

89Emphasis my own.

90The Holy Bible. 2 Kings. 9:8. New International Version (2011). London: Hodder & Staughton.

91Strong, J. (1890) The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible Cincinnati: Jennings & Graham. pp. 115, 122.

indeed a totemic92 word, but in the context of the Bible, it is an epithet used for males. Šātan meaning ‘one who urinates’ and furtherly being translated to ‘piss’, Piss Christ could also be descriptive of Christ’s humanity, indeed, Christ was one who urinated; he was distinctly human and corporeal. We can see that the artwork’s title preserves and at the same time subverts ‘piss’ from its vulgar meaning back into its traditional meaning as used in biblical times.

Something that Fisher and Ramsay neglect to reference is the full title of Serrano’s artwork, which is: Immersion (Piss Christ). Immersion is at the forefront of Serrano’s title and is a word commonly used in reference to baptism. The use of ‘immersion’in its literal meaning is perhaps an obvious reference to Christ being immersed in urine, but it also functions symbolically as the sacred immersion taken by Christians. Baptism symbolises death, burial, and resurrection. The immersion represents the death and consequently, the burial of Jesus Christ, but in reference to Romans 6:393, it also represents the death of our natural selves to our sin During baptism, we die with Christ, and are reborn alongside him. Richard Lazarus states that, ‘compassion is the state in which one is moved by another’s suffering and wanting to help’. Compassion literally means ‘to suffer with’94. For Christians, especially those who have been baptised, when we look at Serrano’s Immersion, we can see ourselves within it, for we too have suffered with Christ

Serrano’s work has the possibility of inviting compassion from its viewers of varying sects of Christianity and non-Christians alike due to the commonality of suffering that we all share as humans. The juxtaposition of Immersion with Piss Christ in the title is itself an

92Richards, M. (1999) ‘Taking The Piss: From Serrano To Surfwear’, Media International Australia, 92(1), pp. 41. doi:10.1177/1329878x9909200106. ‘Piss is a totemic word, a symbol of defilement and also deprecation’.

93The Holy Bible. Romans. 6:3. King James Version. Michican: Zondervan Grand Rapids. ‘Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?’

94Lovette-Colyer, M.E. (2016) ‘The Spirituality of Immersion: Solidarity, Compassion, Relationship’, Engaging Pedagogies in Catholic Higher Education, 2(1), p. 3. doi:10.18263/2379-920x.1008.

Aufhebung, preserving the Christian tradition of baptism while offering a negation through subverting the material commonly used, swapping water for urine. Immersion is an obvious biblical word as well as a literal definition of the activity the crucifix has undertaken, and ‘piss’ is a word that may provoke people due to its perceived offensiveness, but nonetheless remains inoffensivein literal biblical terms. Ifanimmersionduringbaptism isthedeath ofsin andcause of rebirth, I believe that Serrano’s use of urine is getting across the following message: Christ died for your sins, yet in his death, you continued to drown in sin. I say this not in a spiteful tone, but in the sense that since greed is a sin, and because of the greed of capitalism, sin is thus the root cause of poverty and much of our suffering. It could be the case that Christ may as well have been baptised in urine because his sacrifice was in vain For Serrano, Christ’s messageis not being used, his teachings havebeen appropriated bythoseat thetop in oursocial hierarchy. The piece wants us to have compassion for Christ, it wants us to understand his suffering, but it also wants us to treat Christ with more reverence. If we were to give Serrano a charitable understanding of his work as opposed to an assumption of mere bad character, we would also be better engaging with Christ’s teachings. Michael Himes posits that ‘by loving one another’do we ‘find out what the word ‘God’means’95

Reflection

As modern-day humans have degenerated ‘piss’ to indicate vulgarity, this aligns with Serrano’s perspective that Christ himself has been degenerated and desecrated in a way that goes against his original purpose and teachings. Just as Marx’s ‘opium of the people’ can be better understood in modern times as ‘penicillin of the people’, Serrano’s use of ‘Piss’ in the photograph’s title can potentially be understood as ‘one who urinates’, ‘male’, and with the context of the Bible passages containing ‘pisseth against the wall’, Piss Christ can also be

95Ibid., p. 4.

understood as a male who has been cursed This ultimately reflects Christ’s life of suffering, andasAgambenproclaims,‘cursediseveryonewhohangsonatree’96.With Serrano’smessage that Christ has been desecrated in his afterlife through irreverence, I believe that the use of ‘Piss’in conjunction with Christ’s name is apt in this case.

The ’blasphemy’ within Piss Christ is founded exclusively on the reactions generated by offence towards the mimetic commodity submerged in urine within the photograph, but we have seen that this object cannot be blasphemed in itself due to it being a synthetic representation of Christ. If Piss Christ can be viewed by believers in a way that invokes more reverence for Christ, then it’s not concrete that the piece itself is sacrilegious. With Serrano’s commentary on the commodification of Christ and bastardising of his teachings, as well as the historical context around modern art, we have seen that much of the backlash was generated on the backs of conservative politicians who paid little attention to Serrano’s message, for it was people like them that Serrano was criticising. With the origins of the word ‘piss’ and the analogies made between the Holy Spirt (‘living water’) and urine within the Bible, there is potential ground forreflectinguponthis pieceas a purposefulduality ofthe sacred and profane; as an Aufhebung. Understanding the inoffensive origins and use of the word ‘piss’ means the title also has the ability to be perceived as a completely neutral sentiment Serrano’s preservation of the original biblical word for ‘urine’ and using this medium likened to the sacred Spirit by God Himself, shows a strong preservation of Christian teachings, while the negation in the piece shows up as the subversive act of inadvertently creating something that some Christians find shocking, confusing, or sacrilegious. There is room for transcendence here if those who find the piece purely blasphemous were to understand these other routes presented earlier in the passage; understanding the piece as an Aufhebung of Christianity, and one that is indeed deeply religious. Being charitable towards Serrano’s message allows us to

96Agamben, G. (2010) The Sacrament of Language. Cambridge: Polity Press, p. 37.

participate in the potential for transcendence by immersing ourselves in Piss Christ, coming together as humans from varying beliefs to share our empathy and understanding for the suffering that not only Christ endured, but that we and our fellow humans also endure.

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