Eroticism and death in art

Abstract

This paper proposes and analyses the link between eroticism and death in a few artistic manifestations. Our analysis discusses how much this link is filled with tragedy and divinity, with agony and hedonism. Within the eroticized discourses that permeate contemporary society, eroticism is defined as a result of the dialectic clash between what in beings is continuous and in subjects is discontinuous. Such distinction is adopted in the light of scholars having worked on this topic, in particular Georges Bataille. After a synthesis of the history of tension between Eros and Thanatos, we briefly appreciate, from this point of view, a few works of art. Then we make a short study of the painting Great sece of agony, by the German expressionist Max Beckmann.

keywords: eroticism; death; art.