Drawing Blood

We will be back soon with the second half of season two!

Emma and Christy discuss M. Night Shyamalan’s 2021 film Old. We talk about what makes good (and bad) horror; harmful representations of disability in movies, art, and society; aging and chronic illness; the history of medical experimentation; critical disability studies; and “crip time”. We may not recommend actually watching this film, but we definitely recommend thinking through some of what’s going on in it! CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE IMAGES WE DISCUSS, as well as complete show notes, references, and suggestions for further reading. MEDIA DISCUSSED Old (2021) Movie poster Hotelier offering the secluded beach trip to the Cappa family Mid-Sized Sedan Corpse floating to bump into Trent Cappa Close-up of Chrystal’s make-up streaked face as she dies The Sixth Sense (1999) Midsommar (2019) (see our previous episode on this film) Get Out (2017) Unbreakable (2020) Split (2016) Ann Radcliffe, Mysteries of Udolpho (1794) The Kingsman (2014), the ‘Gazelle’ ‘super crip’ character Poster for the Degenerate Art Exhibition of 1937 The Black Stork, 1917 film CREDITS This season of ‘Drawing Blood’ was funded in part by the Association for Art History. Follow our Twitter @drawingblood_ Audio postproduction by Sias Merkling ‘Drawing Blood’ cover art © Emma Merkling All audio and content © Emma Merkling and Christy Slobogin Intro music: ‘There Will Be Blood’ by Kim Petras, © BunHead Records 2019. We’re still trying to get hold of permissions for this song – Kim Petras text us back!!

Emma and Christy look at Frances Glessner Lee’s Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death (c. 1940s) AKA dollhouses of death. We talk Victorian children and dollplay; the origins of legal medicine; CSI as visual analysis; Barbies and buzzcuts; girlbossing on the police force; busybodies, gender, and the history of policing; class voyeurism; contemporary art and crime scene photography; Sherlock Holmes; and the afterlives of evidence. CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE IMAGES WE DISCUSS, as well as complete show notes, references, and suggestions for further reading. MEDIA DISCUSSED Frances Glessner Lee, 'Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death' (VR experience) (c. 1940s) Frances Glessner Lee, 'Living Room' and details ('Body' and 'Cigarettes') (c. 1943–48) Frances Glessner Lee, 'Chicago Symphony Orchestra (Detail)' (c. 1930s) Narcissa Niblack Thorne, 'Thorne Miniature Rooms' (c. 1930s) Ben Shahn, 'The Passion of Sacco and Vanzetti' (1931–32) The Scarpetta House Frances Glessner Lee, 'Red Bedroom' and detail (c. 1944–48) Frames Glessner Lee, 'Parsonage Parlor' and detail (c. 1946–48) Pre-Raphaelite painting: William Holman Hunt, 'The Awakening Conscience' (1853) Angela Strassheim, 'Evidence (Kitchen Knife 2)' (2009) Angela Strassheim, 'Evidence (Pistol 1)' (2009) Angela Strassheim, 'Evidence No. 8' (2009) Angela Strassheim, Left Behind series, 'Untitled (Horses)' (2004) Paul Seawright, Sectarian Murder series, 'Tuesday 3rd April 1973' (1988) Stephen Chalmers, 'Unmarked' Series (c. 2010) CREDITS This season of ‘Drawing Blood’ was funded in part by the Association for Art History. Follow our Twitter @drawingblood_ Audio postproduction by Sias Merkling ‘Drawing Blood’ cover art © Emma Merkling All audio and content © Emma Merkling and Christy Slobogin Intro music: ‘There Will Be Blood’ by Kim Petras, © BunHead Records 2019. We’re still trying to get hold of permissions for this song – Kim Petras text us back!!

Emma and Christy play The Sims 4 Paranormal ‘Stuff Pack’, exploring the game’s haunted house and séance aesthetics. We talk Victorian occult imaginaries, playing Sims as an emotional outlet, the promise of perfect capitalism, video games and affect, queer computer spaces, technopagans and cyber covens, and esoteric beliefs on the internet. CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE IMAGES WE DISCUSS, as well as complete show notes, references, and suggestions for further reading. MEDIA DISCUSSED All screenshots from The Sims 4 Paranormal can be found, in order of discussion, in the image carousel on the episode page linked above. Electronic Arts, The Sims 4 Paranormal ‘Stuff Pack’ (2021) Jordan Peele, Get Out (2017) Jean-Marc Vallée, Sharp Objects (2018) Solomon J. Solomon, A Conversation Piece (1884) The green ghost, ‘Slimer’, from: Ivan Reitman, Ghostbusters (1984) Electronic Arts, ‘Can a computer make you cry’ advertisement (1983) ‘Miss Calendar’ from: Joss Whedon, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003) Linden Lab, Second Life (first released 2003) CREDITS This season of ‘Drawing Blood’ was funded in part by the Association for Art History. Follow our Twitter @drawingblood_ Audio postproduction by Sias Merkling ‘Drawing Blood’ cover art © Emma Merkling All audio and content © Emma Merkling and Christy Slobogin Intro music: ‘There Will Be Blood’ by Kim Petras, © BunHead Records 2019. We’re still trying to get hold of permissions for this song – Kim Petras text us back!!

Emma and Christy look at the ethics, politics, and practice of displaying human remains — from museum collections of mummies to photographs of dead bodies. We talk bog bodies, the rights of the dead, dry vs. ‘wet’ specimens, Free Renty, consent, repatriation, museums’ imperial histories, burdens of care, and how recent art — from Andres Serrano to Gala Porras-Kim — might exacerbate or enact solutions to these issues. CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE IMAGES WE DISCUSS, as well as complete show notes, references, and suggestions for further reading. PLEASE NOTE: we have elected not to include Serrano's photographs in this carousel because they contain content viewers may find especially upsetting. To view these images, click the image link beside his name below. OBJECTS DISCUSSED: Gala Porras-Kim, Sunrise for 5th-Dynasty Sarcophagus from Giza at the British Museum (2022) Photographs from the ‘Life Before Death’ exhibition by Walter Schels at the Wellcome Collection (2008) Andres Serrano, The Morgue (select works) (1992) [GRAPHIC CONTENT WARNING] Louis Agassiz, Renty, An African Slave (1850) Head of Tollund Man, a bog body (from c. 375–210 BC) Gala Porras-Kim, Sights Beyond the Grave (2022) Gala Porras-Kim, A Terminal Escape from the Place that Binds Us (2021) Gala Porras-Kim, Mould Extraction (2022): view one and view two   CREDITS: ‘Drawing Blood’ was made possible with funding from the Experimental Humanities Collaborative Network. Follow our Twitter @drawingblood_ Audio postproduction by Sias Merkling ‘Drawing Blood’ cover art © Emma Merkling All audio and content © Emma Merkling and Christy Slobogin Intro music: ‘There Will Be Blood’ by Kim Petras, © BunHead Records 2019. We’re still trying to get hold of permissions for this song – Kim Petras text us back!!

Emma and Christy explore the story of surgeon-saints Cosmas and Damian through paintings of the ‘miracle of the black leg’ from c. 1370-1495 in Italy and Spain. These pictures bring up complicated ideas around visibility and race, surgery, and historiography. In this episode, we talk Blackness in early modern Europe, organ donation and race, the long history of systemic racism in the medical system, surgeon-historians, and looking at the past from a modern perspective. CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE IMAGES WE DISCUSS, as well as complete show notes, references, and suggestions for further reading. IMAGES DISCUSSED: Master of Los Balbases, A verger’s dream: Saints Cosmas and Damian performing a miraculous cure by transplantation of a leg (c. 1495) Hans Holbein the Younger, The Ambassadors (1533) Joan Miró, A Star Caresses the Breast of a Negress (Painting Poem) (1938) Fra Angelico, The Healing of Justinian by Saint Cosmas and Saint Damian (c. 1438-1440) Matteo di Pacino, St. Cosmas and St. Damian (c. 1370-1375) Kara Walker, Gone: An Historical Romance of a Civil War as It Occurred b’tween the Dusky Thighs of One Young Negress and Her Heart (1994) Example of a 19th-century silhouette portrait: Mamma (c. 1834) Sano di Pietro, Madonna col Bambino Angeli e Santi, Predella con Storie dei Santi Cosma e Damiano (1444) School of Castile and Leon, Saints Cosmas and Damian Healing a Christian with a Leg of a Dead Moor (c. 1460-1480) Image of a dark-skinned man with a white nose: From the ‘Dissertation of Noses’ in A Solution to the Question (1733) CREDITS: ‘Drawing Blood’ was made possible with funding from the Experimental Humanities Collaborative Network. Follow our Twitter @drawingblood_ Audio postproduction by Sias Merkling ‘Drawing Blood’ cover art © Emma Merkling All audio and content © Emma Merkling and Christy Slobogin Intro music: ‘There Will Be Blood’ by Kim Petras, © BunHead Records 2019. We’re still trying to get hold of permissions for this song – Kim Petras text us back!!

Emma and Christy look at Ari Aster’s 2019 folk horror film Midsommar and talk environmentalism, nationalism, community, grief, horror (obviously), folk art, facial transplants, whiteness, screaming, and IKEA. CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE IMAGES WE DISCUSS, as well as complete show notes, references, and suggestions for further reading. IMAGES DISCUSSED: The camera turns upside down as the Americans enter Hälsingland Part of the Ättestupa ritual (and the fall off the cliff) The Hårga in their white clothing The painting at the beginning of Midsommar Dani as May Queen (and the famous ‘frown’) Christian sewn into the bear suit Dani running and choking in front of the burning building Dani during the maypole dance Grass growing from Dani’s hands and feet Josh’s foot sticking out of the ground Stig Lindberg, Melodie (1947) Francis Bacon, Study after Velázquez’s Portrait of Pope Innocent X (1953) The face-smashing part of the Ättestupa ritual Facial difference: the Hårga’s inbred oracle A member of the Hårga wearing Mark’s face The yellow and blue A-frame building (IKEA vibes) CREDITS: ‘Drawing Blood’ was made possible with funding from the Experimental Humanities Collaborative Network. Follow our Twitter @drawingblood_ Audio postproduction by Sias Merkling ‘Drawing Blood’ cover art © Emma Merkling All audio and content © Emma Merkling and Christy Slobogin Intro music: ‘There Will Be Blood’ by Kim Petras, © BunHead Records 2019. We’re still trying to get hold of permissions for this song – Kim Petras text us back!!

Emma and Christy discuss surgical and cultural ideas embedded in Andy Warhol’s series of Before and After paintings (1961/62) of a nose job. In this episode we talk plastic surgery and big egos, the before-and-after image trope, racial typification, criminology, connoisseurship, and American consumerism and capitalism. CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE IMAGES WE DISCUSS, as well as complete show notes, references, and suggestions for further reading. IMAGES DISCUSSED: Andy Warhol, Before and After [1] (1961) Old Lady / Young Lady Optical Illusion (See also: William Ely Hill, My Wife and My Mother-in-Law (1915)) National Enquirer Ad (recurring ad; ran at least in 1961 and 1962) Andy Warhol, Campbell’s Soup Cans (1962) Andy Warhol, Marilyn Monroe (1967) Andy Warhol, Before and After [2] (1961) Andy Warhol, Before and After [4] (1962) Example of: Jackson Pollock (1948) Example of: Lee Krasner (1964) Example of: Roy Lichtenstein (1964) (note his use of Ben Day dots for the girl’s skin) Andy Warhol, Coca-Cola [3] (1962) Andy Warhol, Bonwit Teller window with paintings (1961) Margaret Bourke White, The Louisville Flood (1937) Leonardo da Vinci, Salvator Mundi (c. 1500) Giovanni Morelli, Ears Illustration from Italian Painters (1892) Alphonse Bertillon, Ear Photographs from Identification of Persons (1893) Examples of Francis Galton’s composite images: The Jewish Type (c. 1877–c. 1890) and Composite Portraits of Criminal Types (1877) H. Stickland Constable, illustration showing an alleged similarity between ‘Irish Iberian’ and ‘Negro’ features in contrast to the higher ‘Anglo-Teutonic’ (late 19th c.) Photograph by Mark Peckmezian for The New Yorker, Recreation of colouring Roman busts: the Treu Head (second century AD); see also marble bust showing traces of red pigment on lips, eyes, and the fillet (first century AD) Andy Warhol, 13 Most Wanted Men (example from the most wanted men series of works) (1967) CREDITS: ‘Drawing Blood’ was made possible with funding from the Experimental Humanities Collaborative Network. Follow our Twitter @drawingblood_ Audio postproduction by Sias Merkling ‘Drawing Blood’ cover art © Emma Merkling All audio and content © Emma Merkling and Christy Slobogin Intro music: ‘There Will Be Blood’ by Kim Petras, © BunHead Records 2019. We're still trying to get hold of permissions for this song – Kim Petras text us back!!

Emma and Christy look at archival photographs from the séances of Mina 'Margery' Crandon (around 1925) and talk slimy protrusions, sex, scientific photography, the testing of mediums, and the science of spiritualism. CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE IMAGES WE DISCUSS, as well as complete show notes, references, and suggestions for further reading. IMAGES DISCUSSED: Will Conant, Untitled (Ectoplasmic Hand Emerging from Margery's Navel) (1925) The Belvedere Torso (1st century BC) William Hunter, 'Table 6' in The Anatomy of the Human Gravid Uterus Exhibited in Tables (1774) Baron von Schrenck Notzing, 'Flashlight Photograph [of Eva Carrière]' (1911) in Phenomena of Materialisation (1913) Will Conant, Untitled (Ectoplasmic Hand Emerging from Margery's Navel and Resting on Eric Dingwall's Hand) (1925) [Photographer unknown], Untitled (Margery in a Trance During a Séance) (c. 1925) Carolee Schneemann, Interior Scroll (1975) [Photographer unknown], Untitled (Margery Under Control: Neck Secured with Steel Wire) (c. 1925) Annie Louisa Swynnerton, Cupid and Psyche (1890) [Photographer unknown], Untitled (Walter Putting Ectoplasmic Sample into Test Tubes) (1924) [Photographer unknown], Untitled (Walter's Hand Emerges from Margery and is Fingerprinted in Wax) (1925) (The archival photographs of Margery belong to the Harry Price Archives at Senate House Library, and the Society for Psychical Research, London.) CREDITS: ‘Drawing Blood’ was made possible with funding from the Experimental Humanities Collaborative Network. Follow our Twitter @drawingblood_ Audio postproduction by Sias Merkling ‘Drawing Blood’ cover art © Emma Merkling All audio and content © Emma Merkling and Christy Slobogin Intro music: ‘There Will Be Blood’ by Kim Petras, © BunHead Records 2019. We're still trying to get hold of permissions for this song – Kim Petras text us back!!

Explore the haunting beauty of Lee Miller's surreal photographs of severed breasts, merging art and medicine in unsettling ways. The hosts dive into the uncanny aesthetics and feminist implications, questioning consent and objectification. They discuss Miller's complex legacy, her role as both muse and artist, and the chilling history of surgical photography. With humor and horror, the conversation reveals the tension between art and reality, challenging modern viewers to confront their discomfort with fragmented bodies.