Tag: wounds

Gina Pane

François d´Assise, trois fois aux blessures stigmatisé,
Vérification-version 1
[Francisco de Asis, tres veces estigmatizado con heridas,
verificación-versión 1; Francis of Assisi, three times stigmatised
with wounds, verification –version 1 ], 1985-87

“This work came about following a visit to the Bardi chapel in Florence where gina pane saw the frescoes
by Giotto. It depicts the verification of Francis of Assisi’s stigmata on his death bed. The saint is
recumbent and his wounds are visible, with a monk introducing his hand into each wound to verify its
existence. The spectator, according to gina pane’s account, is presented with a double perception of the
stigmata in St Francis’s painted body and in the gesture of the monk that verifies them.
The French-Italian artist was greatly influenced by reading texts by the saint and she believed that they
were still valid today, to the point of deciding to visit Assisi to see for herself the places the saint had
frequented.
The stigmata are represented in this work by means of circles. The piece is made up of three parts on
three levels. For the lowest she used metal that had been left to rust, akin to an alchemical process,
looking on rust as a living material that contains water, the vital liquid for the human body. One can
perceive the saint’s skeleton in the sheet in the middle part made of galvanised iron that was later
polished and silver-plated. The third and top part is made of glass, giving it a more abstract quality
redolent of an icon. The image of the stigmata, which are polished here, represents the transparency
which is the very sign of the stigmata”

—Juan Vicente