Society's Abyss.

The statement I put up beside my piece:

From the selection of concepts I randomly choose Composition, Society, and Dante's Inferno.  From my research I developed a poem which follows the same rhyming pattern (Terza Rima) as Dante's Inferno and is written in Gothic Rotunda style.  Like the hell of Dante's inferno, Witch Hunts have been omnipresent in Western culture for centuries.  While Dante's Inferno deals with Divine Judgement of the sinful after death, the Witch Hunts are an example of misplaced societal judgement before death, thus highlighting society's own downfall or capabilities to endlessly repeat mistakes.  The mirror is a tool often used to discover the mark of the devil on accused people.  I use the mirror to discover the words of the poem.  The poem is faded and nearly illegible, just as the horror of the tortures used in Witch Hunts has faded due to desensitisation.  The editions are bound to become a Book of Spells, a play on the religious Book of Kells. 

Here are the photos of the completed art work:

The Poem reads:

Swinging from a man-made rope

Or roasting on a bed of wood;

Cruel judgement tore away the hope

Increasing the wrath of "common good" 

And still today we see the sky

Lighting up, 'cos those who could

Ignited another witch todie.

Nighttime hides the ones who come,

Justice cloaking sinners sly:

Uneasiness to the beat of Hitler's drum

Sounding out fears ill-founded;

'Though what good can come from 

Innocent and soul divided?

Condemned by their peers,

Every victim's life upended,

Silenced by the age-old fears

Of spells cast and poisons evil.

Fleeing the taunts and angry jeers -

Mass hysteria caused upheaval-

Often suspects flee from kin

Darkened by mentation medieval

Evading torture to begin

Rebuilding lives and dreams beside

Neighbours too accused of sin.

Day after day, far and wide,

Across the plains of ground and time,

Yesterday has been denied

When the sinless fall to impossible crime;

Ignorance is no longer bliss.

Tolling bells together chime

Cacophonies of laws remiss -

Heralding the killing spree.

Hunts of witches cause this 

Unfair disregard for history

Nullifying the need to pray.

These injustices of witch hunts can be

Seen in societies of modern day. 

copyright 2008 by M.M.W. (Marjolein Wouters)