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EX-VOTO OFFERING TO ST. SABINO
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Artistic action "Ex-voto offering to St. Sabino", 3rd Be-coming Tree Global Live Art Event (09.01.2021),
Serra da S.ª Justa, Valongo, Portugal
My participation in Be-coming Tree Global Live Art Event consisted in an enactment of a religious ritual of ex-voto offering. The artistic action was an appeal for cure of a birch that was drastically pruned. Throughout it, I paid a visit to a chapel, dedicated to St. Sabino, where I laid down an offering: a branch of a tree, made of wax and a framed photograph of the birch tree in question.
Short video of the 3rd Be-coming Tree Global Live Art Event. Credentials: Be-coming Tree team
Making of of the wax figure:
Firstly, I sculptured a clay brunch. Then I created two molds in orthodontic alginate impression material, which permitted me a detailed print of my matrix. I melted candles and I poured the wax inside the molds and, while still warm, I joined the two parts.
In the Catholic religion ex-voto is an offering to saints or deities. Beyond the shape of a painting, an inscription or a photography, the ex-voto often appears in that of a wax-sculpture. In between the diverse figures made in wax, one distinguishes easily the so called "organic ones". The latter could take the shape of an eye, leg, arm, had, stomach and intestines, breasts, or even a baby. Through them a pledge is made for cure of the part of the human body being ill.
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