Next week, Lent ends with Holy Week - the part of the church year were Christ's Passion is commemorated. New testament scenes of suffering, repentance, and the agonized waiting in the run up to Easter, inspired a peak in art production. Perhaps this peak is reached most poignantly in Allegri's falsobordone setting of Psalm 51, which culminates in a soaring top C sung by a young boy, a countertenor or a castrati. So greatly prized was this piece by the papacy, that anyone who would copy it and make it leave the Sistine Chapel would be excommunicated. More than any Stabat Mater of Saint Matthew's Passion, this Miserere Deus Mei leaves one urgently in need of consolation.
For this week of stylished suffering, floating on the first spring breeze over the heads of those in the restaurant, are Lynne Leegte's handkerchiefs.
Lynne Leegte uses luxurious materials like alabaster and silk, and constructs a set in her studio figuring herself in combination with carefully selected attributes.
So, as consolation is at hand, feel free to flow your tears.
