Contemporary Images of Christ: Roof: Rest After The Passion (Batman and Christ) Version 2, (Batman with Christ Returns Newspaper), 1973, Gelatin silver print.
Joel-Peter Witkin is a photographer whose images of the human condition are undeniably powerful. For more than forty years, he has pursued his interest in spirituality and how it impacts the physical world in which we exist. Finding beauty within the grotesque, Witkin pursues this complex issue through people most often cast aside by society-human spectacles including hermaphrodites, dwarfs, amputees, androgynies, carcasses, people with odd physical anomalies, fetishists, and “any living myth… anyone bearing the wounds of Christ”. His fascination with other people’s physicality has inspired works that confront our sense of normalcy and decency while constantly examining the teachings handed down through Christianity.
