Caput mortuum – Im Namen des Islam
4 etchings, 2015, 96 x 76 cm – 96 x 192 cm“Caput mortuum”, the Latin word for skull, is sometimes used in the sense of “rejects” or “worthless stuff”. However, caput mortuum is also a synthetic iron oxide pigment that produces a violet cherry-red color. Folk etymology, which tends to be drastic, wants this pigment to be derived from the discoloration of the coagulated blood at the cut surface of decapitated heads. This pigment caput mortuum is what the artist uses as printing ink. Which brings us back to ISIS/DAESH, which uses a world religion as an excuse for beheading fellow human beings in the name of Islam, in order to praise the greatness of Allah in an act of sacrilegious delusion.
Herbert Koehler