Inspired by Blood
Gabriele Tinti creates poetry at Getty
Gabriele Tinti at the Blood: Medieval/Modern exhibition looking at Bloodscape X, 1987, Andres Serrano. Silver dye bleach print, 40 × 60 in. Getty Museum, Gift of Robert and Dolores Cathcart. Image: © Andres Serrano, courtesy of the artist and Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Paris/Brussels, 2001.95
Body Content
In the Getty Center’s Manuscripts Gallery, something unprecedented is going on.
Blood: Medieval/Modern is the first exhibition to combine medieval manuscripts with contemporary art. The pieces span 1,000 years of the history of art and focus on a singular subject: blood.
Over its 12-week run, Blood has drawn art lovers from all over the world, as well as artists. Poet Gabriele Tinti flew in from Italy—shortly after Willem Dafoe read one of his poems at the Pantheon—to see the exhibition first-hand.
Gabriele Tinti at the Blood: Medieval/Modern Exhibition at the Getty Center looking at Initial G: The Stigmatization of St. Francis, from a gradual, about 1275, attributed to Rinaldo da Siena. Tempera colors and gold leaf, 20 13/16 x 14 5/8 in. Getty Museum, Ms. 71 (2003.15), verso
An ekphrastic poet, Tinti draws inspiration from evocative works of art to create vivid poems “in the form of laments, attempts at prayers, fragments, and confessions inspired by these subjects.”
At LACMA, he captured the last moments of The Hope of Herakles as he unflinchingly faced death. At the British Museum in London, Apollo’s cracked visage came to life with vengeful regret.
At Blood: Medieval/Modern, Tinti drew inspiration from multiple works on display, both medieval and modern.
Gabriele Tinti at the Blood: Medieval/Modern exhibition looking at The Flagellation, from Prayer Book of Cardinal Albrecht of Brandenburg, about 1525–1530, Simon Bening. Tempera colors, gold paint, and gold leaf, 6 5/8 × 4 1/2 in. Getty Museum, Ms. Ludwig IX 19 (83.ML.115), fol. 154v
“Blood,” says Tinti, “has always had a fundamental role in art and theology, in the attempt, typical of every era, to give meaning to life and death, in constructing aesthetic ideals.”
In Devotion—the first section of the exhibition, which highlights the significance of blood in late medieval Christian devotion—Tinti was drawn to illuminations depicting “the drama of the Passion, the decisive moment in which Jesus undergoes every possible humiliation, flogging, derision” and his public, “most ignominious death on the cross, a most horrible execution.”
The Flagellation, from Prayer Book of Cardinal Albrecht of Brandenburg, about 1525–1530, Simon Bening. Tempera colors, gold paint, and gold leaf, 6 5/8 × 4 1/2 in. Getty Museum, Ms. Ludwig IX 19 (83.ML.115), fol. 154v
Ecce Homo, from Poncher Hours, about 1500, Jean Pichore. Tempera colors, ink and gold, 5 1/4 × 3 7/16 in. Getty Museum, Ms. 109 (2011.40), fol. 194
The Crucifixion, from a book of hours, about 1430–1440, Master of Sir John Fastolf. Tempera colors, gold leaf, and ink, 4 3/4 × 3 5/8 in. Getty Museum, Ms. 5 (84.ML.723), fol. 98v
Initial G: The Stigmatization of St. Francis, about 1275, attributed to Rinaldo da Siena. Tempera colors and gold leaf, 20 13/16 × 14 5/8 in. Getty Museum, Ms. 71 (2003.15), verso
Among the modern works is a piece by his long-time collaborator Andres Serrano. Bloodscape X appears not only in Blood, but on the cover of Serrano’s 2020 book, Bleedings—Incipit Tragoedia.
The two have worked together on several publications, and in light of that, Tinti drew from some of the verses published in Bleedings (La Nave di Teseo/Contra Mundum Press) and Confessions (Eris Press), another of their collaborative works.
Serrano reads Bloodscape, one of the poems he created for Blood. You can listen to that, and his pieces inspired by Ecce Homo, St. Francis, Flagellation, and The Crucifixion below.
And there's still time to visit Blood: Medieval/Modern before it closes on May 19.
Special thanks to the Italian Cultural Institute of Los Angeles.
