Appropriation Worksheet

Josias Murer was an artist who practiced in the late 16th century. He is best known for his images depicting the speech and throat organs of various mammals. The engraving on the left is titled Anatomy of a man’s throat from Giulio Cesare Casserio’s book De vocis auditusque organis historia anatomia (Anatomical History of the Organs of Speech and Hearing). Dr Lakra has appropriated (borrowed) this imagery used by early anatomical artists.

Find the artwork by Dr Lakra that has been appropriated from the much older Murer artwork. Compare (look for similarities) and contrast (look for differences) in the artworks.

Murer is studying the organs of the throat and speech in his image. What other areas of the body does Dr Lakra examine in his artworks?

Why do you think that Dr Lakra has chosen this particular style of imagery to appropriate?

Qin Ga

Qin Ga was born in Inner Mongolia in 1971. He originally trained as a sculptor at the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing. Later, in the 1990s, Qin Ga became known as a key figure of Beijing’s thriving underground art scene. His developing interest in performance art was underpinned by an eagerness to utilise the human form, to examine the relationship between the body and nature. Early works such as Drug Bath, Freeze, and Disinfect present morbid scenes where the human body is in itself the artwork.

Qin Ga’s landmark performance art project, The miniature long march (2002-2005), calls on the power of tattoo as a permanent tool of remembrance, and one through which the artist can explore the relationship between private and collective memory.

Through his use of tattoo as a mark making tool in the project, Qin Ga is utilising the human body as both the artwork itself in a performative sense, and as a moving canvas for the artwork. This duality is emphasised by the still and moving footage documentation produced throughout the project.

His participation in the Long March Project’s Walking Visual Display began with the donation of his skin as a canvas in 2002. The project recreated the famous route of the Long March (1934-1935), a pivotal moment in Chinese history when the Red Army of the Communist Part of China retreated to skirt the advances of Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party). Qin Ga remained in his Beijing studio, communicating with the project’s participants and marking their progress on a miniature map of China tattooed across his back.

The project prematurely ended at Luding Bridge in Sichuan province, leaving Qin Ga’s tattoo of the Long March incomplete. In 2005, he resolved to complete the journey from Luding Bridge, a commitment that would see him endure extreme physical hardship due to the harsh elements. Setting out with his tattooist and three cameramen, the artist completed the journey, having the journey etched into his skin on location.

There could be no more appropriate medium for Qin Ga to have documented his journey with than tattoo; in doing so he demonstrates the connection between body and nature; the individual and our shared culture, customs and history; and, as with many great tattoos, forever commemorates a defining personal experience.