Crucifixion II (Immersions)

In 1986, I received a studio visit from Bill Olander, the chief curator of the New Museum. That visit would radically change the direction of my work. Bill was doing a show called ‘Fake’ an exhibition dealing with inauthenticity, which gave me the idea to do photographs that would mimic painting. The first work, Milk, Blood, was a picture of two tanks, one filled with blood, the other with milk, butted together so all you see is the dividing line between them. It was a reference to Mondrian and started my series with bodily fluids. The first images such as Milk, Blood, Piss, were monochromes. Later I made images mixing the fluids creating colourful abstractions. Soon after I started putting objects in the tanks creating what would become known as the ‘Immersions’, the most famous of which are Piss Christ and Black Supper. *

* Referenced from Andres Serrano’s own narrative