1000 Churches — Dedicated to the Bishop of Bruges

PERFORMANCE · 2013 · CROXHAPOX, GHENT

A performance leading to an installation that dealt with the improprieties of the Catholic church

This work was conceived a year before when I was doing a project at Croxhapox in Ghent, when I found out that the erstwhile Bishop of Bruges admitted to have sexual relations with a minor. Also at Croxhapox, I sent drawings of churches that I and my then eight-year-old son (that was significant by implication of course) made regularly to the gallery. I had a gown made that was an exact replica of the one worn by Gustav Klimt, only the shoulder embroidery were phalluses. (Klimt was not a child molester but he was a lecher.) I enlisted three young art students and dressed them in choirboy robes. I was the ringmaster, giving out the drawings that they then distributed carefully around the walls. The cast-off choirboy outfits were part of the performance’s aftermath installation.