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The Expressionless: Law, Ethics, and the Imagery of Suffering

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Abstract

The essay discusses law’s inability to address the phenomenon of human suffering and, at the same time, investigates a possible theoretical kinship between Walter Benjamin’s notion of ‘the expressionless’ and Emmanuel Levinas’s understanding of suffering as the foundation of an interhuman ethics. The kinship between Levinas and Benjamin is examined with reference to suffering in the visual arts and, more specifically, in Matthias Grünewald’s Isenheim Altarpiece and Francis Bacon’s crucifixion triptychs. The essay argues that in the crucifixion scenes of both Grünewald’s medieval altarpiece and Bacon’s triptychs, suffering is what constitutes ‘the expressionless’. After every detail of the image, every element of attribute, motif, composition and colour have been accurately depicted, a residue still remains, an ethical truth that cannot be appropriated into a meaningful unity but that nevertheless calls for a response. While law must always give suffering a utilitarian value in its attempts to assign responsibility for the injury occurred, the essay argues that the fragmentariness in all true art that Benjamin calls ‘the expressionless’ is akin to Levinas’s understanding of the constitutional uselessness of suffering, its essence as ‘for nothing’.

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Notes

  1. Another reply might claim that law is not meant to address suffering in an ethical way. While this view can be supported with reasonable arguments, the underlying ontological assumption betrays a very bleak understanding of what law is.

  2. E. Levinas, ‘La souffrance inutile’, in Entre nous. Essais sur le penser-à-l’autre (Paris: Grasset, 1991) 107–119, at 108.

  3. Levinas, supra n. 2, at 109–110 [PM: footnote omitted]. In this passage, the French text reads couverture instead of ouverture, but this must be a misprint.

  4. Levinas, supra n. 2, at 111.

  5. See e.g. M. Diamantides, The Ethics of Suffering: Modern Law, Philosophy, and Medicine (Aldershot/Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2000).

  6. An excellent collection of relevant essays – some, perhaps, more ‘romantic’ than others – is E. Christodoulidis and S. Veitch, eds, Lethe’s Law. Justice, Law and Ethics in Reconciliation (Oxford/Portland, OR: Hart, 2001).

  7. P. Minkkinen, ‘Ressentiment as Suffering: On Transitional Justice and the Impossibility of Forgiveness’, Law and Literature 19/3 (2007), 513–531.

  8. On passion art in general, see J.H. Marrow, Passion Iconography in Northern European Art of the Late Middle Ages and Early Renaissance: A Study of the Transformation of Sacred Metaphor into Descriptive Narrative (Kortrijk: Van Ghemmert, 1979). On Levinas and passion art, see M. Slaughter, ‘Levinas, Mercy and the Middle Ages’, in M. Diamantides, ed., Levinas, Law, Politics (Abingdon/New York, NY: Routledge-Cavendish, 2007) 49–69, at 60–63. Slaughter’s essay also deals with Levinas’s views on art more generally.

  9. See, e.g., Romans 5:3–5, 1 Peter 2:19–20, 1 Peter 4:1.

  10. M. Grünewald, Crucifixion, central section of the Isenheim Altarpiece with closed wings (1512–1515). Oil on panel, 269 × 307 cm. Musée d’Unterlinden, Colmar. On the Isenheim Altarpiece in general, see G. Richter, The Isenheim Altar: Suffering and Salvation in the Art of Grünewald (Edinburgh: Floris, 1998).

  11. On the hospital-context of the altarpiece, see A. Hayum, ‘The Meaning and Function of the Isenheim Altarpiece: The Hospital Context Revisited’, The Art Bulletin 59/4 (1977), 501–517.

  12. On the Franco-German history of the altarpiece, see A. Stieglitz, ‘The Reproduction of Agony: Toward a Reception-History of Grünewald’s Isenheim Altar after the First World War’, Oxford Art Journal 12/2 (1989), 87–103.

  13. Sandrart speaks of ‘Matthäus Grünewald, also known as Matthäus of Aschaffenburg’. See J. Sandrart, Teutsche Academie der Bau-, Bild- und Mahlerey-Künste. Band 2 (Nördlingen: Alfons Uhl, 1994), at 236–237.

  14. An often cited historical authority on Gothart Nithart is H. Feuerstein, Matthias Grünewald (Bonn: Verlag der Buchgemeinde, 1930). For a fascinating account of how both Dürer and Grünewald have been used in the construction of a nationalist German identity, see K. Moxey, ‘Impossible Distance: Past and Present in the Study of Dürer and Grünewald’, Art Bulletin LXXXVI/4 (2004), 750–763.

  15. This is the claim made by German historian Hans Jürgen Rieckenberg. See H.J. Rieckenberg, ‘Zum Forschungsstand über die Biographie des Schöpfers des Isenheimer Altars’, Zeitschrift für Bayerische Landesgeschichte 50 (1987), 180–196.

  16. On the Northern Renaissance in general, see J. Snyder, Northern Renaissance Art: Painting, Sculpture, the Graphic Arts from 1350 to 1575 (New York, NY: Harry N. Abrams, 1985).

  17. J.-K. Huysmans, Trois primitifs. Les Grünewald du Musée de Colmar, Le maître de Flémalle et la Florentine du Musée de Francfort-sur-le-Mein (Paris: Léon Vanier, 1905), at 15–16. For a much more innocuous description of Grünewald’s crucifixion scene, see A. Burkhard, ‘The Isenheim Altar’, Speculum 9/1 (1934), 56–69, at 59.

  18. See, e.g., L. Signorelli, The Crucifixion with St Mary Magdalene (c. 1495–1500). Oil on canvas, 247 × 165 cm. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence.

  19. A well-known 20th century painting that makes direct reference to the Isenheim Altarpiece is O. Dix, War Triptych (1929–1932). Tempera on wood, central panel 204 × 204 cm, side panels 204 × 102 cm each. Gemäldegalerie Neue Meister, Dresden.

  20. P. Picasso, Crucifixion (1930). Oil on wood, 51 × 66 cm. Musée national Picasso, Paris. See R. Kaufmann, ‘Picasso’s Crucifixion of 1930’, The Burlington Magazine 111/798 (1969), 553–561.

  21. P. Picasso, Crucifixion after Grünewald (1932). Eight inkwashes and ink drawings, 34 × 51 cm each. Musée national Picasso, Paris. See L. Ullmann, Picasso und der Krieg (Bielefeld: Karl Kerber, 1993), at 44–47.

  22. P. Picasso, Guernica (1937). Oil on canvas, 349 × 776 cm. Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid. On the much-debated political context of the painting, see W. Hofmann, ‘Picasso’s “Guernica” in Its Historical Context’, Artibus et Historiae 4/7 (1983), 141–169.

  23. D. Apostolos-Cappadonna, ‘The Essence of Agony: Grünewald’s Influence on Picasso’, Artibus et Historiae 13/26 (1992), 31–47, at 44.

  24. F. Calvo Serraller and C. Giménez, eds, Spanish Painting from El Greco to Picasso: Time, Truth and History (New York, NY: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 2006), at 386–391.

  25. When questioned about the influence of German and Dutch Renaissance painters, Bacon replies: ‘They mean nothing to me.’ F. Bacon, Entretiens avec Michel Archimbaud (Paris: Gallimard, 1996), at 37. On the other hand, Wieland Schmied explicitly lists Grünewald as an immediate influence, but perhaps as a descendant of the ‘primitives’ celebrated by André Breton and others rather than as a representative of the Northern Renaissance. See W. Schmied, Francis Bacon: Commitment and Conflict (Munich/New York, NY: Prestel, 1996), at 73.

  26. F. Bacon, Three Studies for Figures at the Base of a Crucifixion (1944). Oil and pastel on hardboard. Three panels, 94 × 74 cm each. Tate Modern, London.

  27. J. Russell, Francis Bacon (London: Thames & Hudson, 1971), at 10.

  28. F. Bacon, Three Studies for a Crucifixion (1962). Oil with sand on canvas. Three panels, 198 × 145 cm each. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York.

  29. F. Bacon, Crucifixion (1965). Oil on canvas. Three panels, 197 × 147 cm each. Staatsgalerie Moderner Kunst, Munich.

  30. Bacon painted a fourth crucifixion triptych which, however, is inconsequential for the discussion here. F. Bacon, Second Version of Triptych 1944 (1988). Oil and acrylic on canvas. Three panels, 198 × 147 cm each. Tate Modern, London.

  31. Russell, supra n. 27, at 113.

  32. Bacon identified these spectators as kin to the Oresteian Eumenides. See D. Sylvester, Interviews with Francis Bacon (New York, NY: Thames & Hudson, 2004), at 44–46.

  33. Sylvester, supra n. 32, at 44.

  34. An armature is a standing supportive framework often made of wire around which wax or clay is then sculpted.

  35. D. Anzieu and M. Monjauze, Francis Bacon, ou le portrait de l’homme désespécé (Paris: Seuil/Archimbaud, 2004), at 60–61.

  36. G. Deleuze, Francis Bacon. Logique de la sensation (Paris: Seuil, 2002), at 12 [PM: footnote deleted].

  37. Schmied, supra n. 25, at 76.

  38. Russell, supra n. 27, at 88–90. See also A. Daki, ‘Leiris/Bacon, une amitié à l’œuvre’, Revue de littérature comparée No 306 (2003), 169–181 and Bacon, supra n. 25, at 110–113.

  39. M. Leiris, Miroir de la tauromachie (Paris: Fata Morgana, 1981), at 36–37.

  40. M. Leiris, Francis Bacon, face et profil (Paris: Albin Michel, 2004), at 48–49.

  41. Leiris, supra n. 40, at 130.

  42. See e.g. K. Barth, Die Lehre vom Worte Gottes. Prolegomena zur christlichen Dogmatik. Gesamtausgabe. Band 14 (Zürich: Theologischer Verlag, 1982), at 340–341. On God as the wholly Other and Barth’s dialectical theology, see K. Barth, ‘Das Wort Gottes als Aufgabe der Theologie’, in Vorträge und kleinere Arbeiten 1922–1925. Gesamtausgabe. Band 19 (Zürich: Theologischer Verlag, 1990) 144–175.

  43. See M. Buber, ‘Der Altar’, in Hinweise gesammelte Essays (Zürich: Manesse, 1953) 27–29, J.-L. Nancy, ‘Athéologie chromatique’, in S. Lecoq-Ramond, ed., Histoire du Musée d’Unterlinden et de ses collections: de la Révolution à la Première guerre mondiale (Colmar: Société Schongauer – Musée d’Unterlinden, 2003) 391–398. Both have been published in English in Journal of Visual Culture 4/1 (2005) 116–128.

  44. G. Scholem, Walter Benjamin – die Geschichte einer Freundschaft (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1975), at 51–52.

  45. W. Benjamin, ‘Sokrates’, in Gesammelte Schriften. Band II · I (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1977) 129–132, at 130.

  46. S. Felman, The Juridical Unconscious. Trials and Traumas in the Twentieth Century (Cambridge, MA/London: Harvard University Press, 2002), at 13. See, however, Felman, ibid., at 184–185, notes 114 and 116.

  47. Felman, supra n. 46, at 163–164.

  48. F. Hölderlin, ‘Anmerkungen zum Oedipus’, in Sämtliche Werke. Fünfter Band. Übersetzungen (Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1952) 193–202, at 202. See also F. Hölderlin, ‘Anmerkungen zur Antigonä’, in Sämtliche Werke. Fünfter Band. Übersetzungen (Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1952) 263–273. Philippe Lacoue-Labarthe has provided an influential contemporary reading of Hölderlin’s caesura situating it within the political context of modernity. See P. Lacoue-Labarthe, ‘La césure du spéculatif’, in L’imitation des modernes. Typographies II (Paris: Galilée, 1986) 39–69 and P. Lacoue-Labarthe, La fiction du politique: Heidegger, l’art et la politique (Paris: Cristian Bourgois Editeur, 1987), at 64–72.

  49. C. Wegener, ‘A Music of Translation’, MLN 115/5, Comparative Literature Issue (2000), 1052–1084, at 1066. Blanchot addresses this moment of the caesura as the ‘reversal’ (retournement). See M. Blanchot, ‘L’itinéraire de Hölderlin’, in L’espace littéraire (Paris: Gallimard, 1955) 363–374. Further on Hölderlin: ‘While rhythm disengages the multiple from the unity that eludes it, while it appears regular and seems to set its pace according to the rule, rhythm however threatens the rule because the former always exceeds the latter through a reversal: even if rhythm is at play or in operation within measure, it cannot be measured in it.’ M. Blanchot, L’écriture du désastre (Paris: Gallimard, 1980), at 173–174.

  50. W. Benjamin, ‘Goethes Wahlverwandtschaften’, in Gesammelte Schriften. Band I · I (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1974) 123–201, at 181.

  51. Benjamin, supra n. 50, at 182. On Benjamin’s Hölderlinian affinities in general, see B. Hanssen, ‘“Dichtermut” and “Blödigkeit”: Two Poems by Hölderlin Interpreted by Walter Benjamin’, MLN 112/5, Comparative Literature Issue (1997), 786–816. A further example of the literary expressionless could, perhaps, be Marguerite Duras’s novel The Ravishing of Lol Stein (1964) where the painful numbness of the protagonist’s loveless life is at the same time literature’s inability to express her suffering in narrative form.

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    Panu Minkkinen

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Correspondence to Panu Minkkinen.

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The author thanks the anonymous reviewers, Desmond Manderson and the Montréal conference, Linda Meyer, Kimmo Nuotio and SOFY, Colin Perrin, Anton Schütz, Marty Slaughter, Cathy and Adam Thurschwell, and Véronique Voruz. For A.H.

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Minkkinen, P. The Expressionless: Law, Ethics, and the Imagery of Suffering. Law Critique 19, 65–85 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10978-007-9021-7

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