In a conference given in 1966, Michel Foucault conceptualized the human body as the point zéro du monde, literally the starting point of the world. Quintessentially, from its lines or through its depth, a body lays out the universe and determines, even politically, one’s connection to his environment.

Although physical, as any frontier it is an agent of inclusion or banishment. Ultimately, a ravaged body sentences its owner to a form of social exile.

My friend Antoine Catala told me about a museum in Paris that somehow classified some of these exiles. It collects casts of skin diseases.

Located within the walls of the Hospital Saint-Louis, the Musée des maladies de peaux owns 4807 pieces predominantly manufactured by Jules Baretta between 1884 and 1913.

Michel Foucault, Le corps utopique, Radio feature: France Culture, 1966
French, no subtitles (sorry).

by Janosch Mallwitz, 2010

“Crippled to the death”, she said and started laughing so I started laughing and she lit a black cigar and we smoked it, smoking and smoking and smoking until there was nothing but white, or near-yellowish white, and I could see nothing except smoke and I was all so very glad to be out there, smoking and blind, past the tables and chairs and people flirting and couples fighting, and the bottles of tonic and the bottles of vodka and the olives. At that moment I realized truly I just missed my mother, a tiny bit, there in the smoke, feeling myself disappearing. I wished I could have seen her one last time; wished I could have been her all along, which is all I ever wanted somehow, as a girl, as a woman even, to be a mother and suddenly I thought back to it all and whispered, “So long, I’m off. I am always trying to imagine death, and I thought I would imagine better one day, but have not.”

Two poor Chinese opium smokers. Gouache painting on rice-paper, 19th century.

Two wealthy Chinese opium smokers. Gouache painting on rice-paper, 19th century.

I never had had.

One who fingers savagely at a material knot and yet cannot undo it. To myself adding: “Have I?” A task in part the tissue of doubt.

I speak, too, of multiple larynxes.

Am I now happy to be able to tell stories and surround others with knotted space and endangered equilibrium?

Talk is conditional.

When do I ever suppose that my words sustain themselves within inner multitudes?

Reflective anonymous designs contribute to the development of one sweet sum which expresses itself as a bursting forth flame in the shanty a voice telling of them.

tracing of a genital tattoo taken from the body of Rangi-Tea-Pakura, a Maori woman of rank
(drawing by Dr. Shortland)

left: tattoos on the right arm of a French thief expelled from France.
right: tattoos on the body of a French sailor and deserter.
(ink drawing 19th century)

inside pages from ‘Chodo Zue’, a book showing a collection of monochrome decorative designs for ‘tansu’ and acessories like boxes for combs and writing sets.
(the compiler Aoki Hisakuni is otherwise unknown)

illustration showing white magnolia blossom (Magnolia altifima) and its seed pod.
(18th century)

oriental Manuscript in Burmese-Pali

New Zealand: Maori wooden club (mere).
(albumen print, 18th century)

plaster cast of the face of Tauque Te Whanoa, a Rotorua native, of the Arawa tribe showing Maori tattooing, ‘Moko’, performed with a serrated chisel and mallet with soot rubbed into the open wound to provide colouring.
plaster cast taken by Sir G. Guy (?)
(1851)

tattoo on a piece of human skin showing a female face
(late 19th century)

tattoo on a piece of human skin showing a male bust and a flower stem
(late 19th century)

Taawattaa, the Priest from Madison Island (Nuku Hiva)
(engraving c. 1813)

human head containing jostling human figures.
(crayon drawing, 1929)

Yantra mediation uses shapes and symbols engraved on to plaques to focus the mind. Mediation and yoga are recommended as part of an Ayurvedic lifestyle. Ayurveda is a Hindu medical traditional that aims to preserve and restore balance in the body through holistic treatments including diet and exercise.
(unkown maker, made bwn 1801-1900 in India)

Te Kuha: a carver and warrior
(watercolour by H.G. Robley)