MURDERS AND ART

INTRODUCTION TO THE ACTIVITY

To resume our discussion about artistic objects, we planned a very intensive and interesting activity. In the third chapter of our story, something very shocking happens: Mr. Hyde kills Dr. Danvers Carrew. A murder in a story? A murder in a work of art? How can that be possible? Why hasn't anybody complained about such a thing? It is unacceptable! A murder is a very serious matter, it is a highly punishable act. People who kill go to prision for that.

Despite the danger, we decided to give a try to the crazy experience of turning a murder into a piece of art, into an artistic object. If we said that everything can be transformed into an artistic object, then we should not have any problems with this. The task was to think about another way in which Mr. Hyde could have killed poor Dr. Danvers. In groups of two, we should represent that in a photo. This time we chose different means to represent, last time was shadow theater, this time photography.

MURDERS, DEATH AND ART

In fact, we are not the first ones to try this. Murder has been considered and respresented by many. many artists since art appeared. Why? Why has been murder a matter of concern? Well, maybe because murder is  intimately related to death and death is something that we, humans, care a lot about. Perhaps, murder is also related to many strong emotions (remember what we said about feelings): envy, anger, vengeance, etc. Of course, you can find many other reasons.

It is very easy to find some examples about this: in Ancient Greece, people enjoyed listening to stories about wars. One of the most important books in the history of literature, the Iliad (Troya, the movie about Aquiles) describes with many details how warriors killed each other. What's more, an Argentinean writer, from Cordoba, wrote a poem back in the XIX century that talks about a strange and cruel method to kill people, you can read it here.

OUR OWN EXPERIENCE

THE TRIAL (activity for 29/3)

Now suppose a judge sees all these pictures we have taken. He decides that we are all crazy and that what we have done is a crime, he charges us with attempted murder. Write your defence, explaining why this is not a real murder but a work of art.
Each group must send to me, by email, a Word document with the activity. You have time until next Friday (29/3). The activity is really short and I will accept no excuses, we will work on this next class. You shall  find all our previous discussions very helpful.

Have a good weekend and enjoy your mini-holidays! See you in April!