It was Carl Trueman who introduced me to the idea of a deathwork, though the concept is Philip Rieff’s. According to Rieff, a deathwork is an assault on something that is hallowed to an established culture. It isn’t a critique or argument that the culture is untrue, but a means of profaning something that is sacred in order to make it seem ridiculous or repulsive. Trueman summarizes it as “the act of using the sacred symbols of a previous era in order to subvert, and then destroy, their original significance and purpose.”
In The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self, Trueman uses the example of Andres Serrano’s repulsive 1987 photograph Piss Christ, which displayed a crucifix immersed in the artist’s urine. He says, “Serrano is not simply mocking the sacred order in this work of art; he has turned it into something dirty, disgusting, and vile… The sacramental is made into the excremental.” By putting a crucifix in urine, Serrano makes the holy an object of mockery.
* * * * * * * *
And that brings me to the forthcoming film adaptations of C.S. Lewis’s Narnia books.
Read the whole thing.