"All union of the sexes is a sign of (coming)
death; and we could not know 'love' were we to live indefinitely."
Anatole France.
The Judgement of Paris
Oil on canvas. 144 inches x 74 inches. c. 1974
In 1974 Lenkiewicz produced a small book titled: Notes on Death and the
Maiden. This ran parallel with the Exhibition of the same title at his
premises on the comer of Clifton Street. The book was an abbreviated version of a large
book of notes on cultural attitudes towards death, corruption and decay. Page 10 of these
notes introduces ideas that linked the fear of hell with the fear of decay. The notes
proceed to develop the idea frequently suggested by art-historians, that the allegory of
Death and the Maiden expresses not only the fear of death but fear of the female.
Lenkiewicz felt this was an unsatisfactory interpretation, and that the issue was complex,
with shadows cast from unexpected areas. He noted the curious attention in Medieval Danse
Macabre images given to the corpses. Striking wood-cuts of decaying representations of
Death dance before their victims on the edges of graves. What seized his attention however
in these ghastly images were the flailing viscera from open abdomens - a parody of
pregnancy:
"...this decomposing woman was designed to bear children, but the
contents of her stomach reveal only the destiny of birth. "
Many of Lenkiewicz's studies for this project considered the cycle of birth and death.
'Death' presenting his intestines to the Maiden was explored along with the formula of the
Three Magi and their Gifts. The decay of the body is frightening. It is this same body,
however, that is bound up with our personal sex lives. Fear may stimulate eroticism and
death takes on unexpected possibilities. Desire and decomposition inter-relate.
Putrefaction need not smell, the decay of 'love' has its own immediately recognisable
odour. Illusions rot and fragment, and as the body filters into the earth, so the memories
of 'loves' vaporise and die. In the decomposition of our 'loves' we unwittingly attend our
own funeral. Death and the Maiden echoes the mortality of our affections, and encourages
us to consider them more carefully.
Robert Lenkiewicz