Crucifix (2024) '60 min - Philemon Mukarno

Crucifix: Philemon Mukarno’s Sacred 60-Minute Naked Performance on Suffering, Redemption, and Spiritual Awakening

Understanding Crucifix as Contemporary Reenactment of Biblical Crucifixion

Philemon Mukarno’s “Crucifix” (2024) represents a powerful 60-minute embodied reenactment of the biblical crucifixion narrative through naked performance art. Developed in collaboration with concept creator Paul Regan and performed during Mukarno’s residency at Live Art Ireland in July 2024, the work engaged the crucifixion story with striking contemporary artistic vision. The performance featured collaborative performers Natalia Panfile, Lauren Kelly, and Lola Velvet alongside Mukarno, creating collective ritual exploring themes of suffering, redemption, vulnerability, and spiritual transformation. The work situated the archetypal narrative of Christ’s suffering within raw honesty of exposed human flesh, inviting audiences toward spiritual encounter transcending conventional religious representations.

The Live Art Ireland residency context provides crucial framework for understanding “Crucifix.” The 10-day mentored summit facilitated by La Pocha Nostra and Vest & Page brought together international performance artists for intensive creative exploration. Mukarno’s participation in developing and presenting “Crucifix” within this community of radical performance artists contributed to broader contemporary conversation about how embodied art engages spiritual and religious themes. The performance became highlight of the artistic residency, demonstrating Mukarno’s capacity to synthesize personal vision with collaborative creative process.

The Crucifixion Narrative: Sacred Story and Embodied Reality

Reenacting Christ’s Ultimate Sacrifice and Vulnerability

The crucifixion story represents perhaps Christianity’s most central narrative—describing Jesus Christ’s execution and subsequent religious significance. The narrative encompasses not merely death but particular mode of death characterized by extreme suffering, public humiliation, and bodily exposure. The traditional account includes presence of Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of Jesus, witnessing the crucifixion. These female witnesses occupy crucial spiritual and emotional dimensions of the narrative—representing both compassion and grief in response to witnessed suffering.

Mukarno’s choice to reenact this specific biblical narrative through naked performance engages multiple layers of religious and spiritual significance simultaneously. The naked body becomes vehicle for exploring crucifixion’s essential dimensions—the vulnerability of exposed flesh, the suffering made tangible through embodied presence, the public nature of the execution stripping away all privacy and protection. The performance suggests that authentic engagement with the crucifixion narrative requires confronting its radical vulnerability and exposure rather than abstracting it into comfortable theology.

Historically, evidence suggests Jesus was likely crucified naked, though contemporary Christian artistic representations typically depict Christ with modest covering. Mukarno’s choice to perform the crucifixion with naked performers restores historical accuracy while simultaneously challenging religious communities’ typical discomfort with embodied nakedness. The exposure of flesh becomes powerful spiritual statement—reclaiming the body as legitimate sacred site rather than shameful object requiring concealment.

The reenactment also engages the crucifixion as universal narrative transcending particular historical moment. While referencing Jesus’s specific crucifixion, the performance invites audiences toward recognizing crucifixion as archetypal human experience—the pattern of suffering, sacrifice, and potential redemption repeating throughout human history. The performance suggests that many humans continue experiencing symbolic crucifixion through oppression, marginalization, suffering, and struggle for liberation. The naked reenactment becomes relevant to contemporary audiences by connecting ancient narrative to present embodied experience.

The Presence of Mary Magdalene and Mary as Witnesses and Participants

The inclusion of female figures—specifically Mary Magdalene and Mary, Jesus’s mother—alongside Mukarno’s performance of Christ carries profound significance. These women occupy crucial positions in Christian narrative and imagery. Mary represents ultimate maternal presence—the figure who bore the crucified Christ and witnesses his suffering. Mary Magdalene represents redemption, transformation, and love transcending judgment and condemnation. Both women embody compassion and witnessing in response to suffering.

The collaborative presence of female performers alongside Mukarno suggests that spiritual transformation emerges through relational encounter rather than isolated individual suffering. Christ’s crucifixion gains meaning through witness—the women present become essential to the narrative’s spiritual significance. Their presence honors how suffering remains incomplete without compassionate witness. The performance suggests that redemption emerges through community formed around recognized vulnerability and shared grief.

The female witnesses also represent alternative responses to patriarchal narratives often centering male authority and control. The women’s roles become active spiritual participation rather than passive observation. Their grief becomes sacred response honoring the crucified body. Their witness becomes form of spiritual power—the capacity to hold space for suffering and transmute it toward meaning and potential healing. The performance elevates women’s roles within crucifixion narrative toward recognition of their profound spiritual significance.

The collaborative structure also challenges typical crucifixion representations where Christ appears in isolation. Mukarno’s performance includes other bodies, other voices, other presence. This multiplicity suggests that the crucifixion becomes meaningful through community—through the gathering of beings acknowledging shared vulnerability and compassionate response toward suffering. The performance challenges individualistic spiritual narratives, instead suggesting that spirituality emerges through relational encounter and collective witness.

The Sacred Significance of Nakedness and Bodily Vulnerability

Flesh Exposed as Symbol of Ultimate Vulnerability and Truth

The central artistic choice to perform the crucifixion with completely naked bodies becomes primary vehicle for communicating the narrative’s deepest spiritual dimensions. Nakedness strips away all protective barriers—social convention, cultural mediation, psychological defense. The exposed flesh becomes paradoxical communication medium—simultaneously most vulnerable and most authentically truthful. The naked body cannot lie or hide; it communicates through direct embodied presence what cannot be fully expressed through words.

The nakedness also specifically engages Christian theological significance of bodily incarnation. Christian tradition teaches that divine became embodied in flesh through Christ—that the spiritual and material dimensions unified in Christ’s body. The naked flesh in Mukarno’s performance reclaims this incarnational theology—suggesting that spirit and matter remain inseparable, that the body constitutes legitimate sacred site rather than obstacle to spirituality. The exposed flesh becomes evidence of divine presence manifesting through material existence.

The vulnerability of nakedness during crucifixion reenactment carries particular intensity. The audience witnesses exposed bodies enacting extreme suffering and vulnerability. The protective barriers most humans maintain between their naked bodies and public gaze dissolve completely. This dissolution creates powerful empathetic response in viewers—their own vulnerability becomes triggered through witnessing another’s exposed vulnerability. The performance becomes ritual where individual defensive barriers soften and collective recognition of shared embodied fragility emerges.

The nakedness also invokes crucifixion’s historical shame dimension. Crucifixion included intentional public humiliation and exposure. Mukarno’s naked performance restores this historical reality to contemporary consciousness. The performance asks what it means that spiritual redemption emerges through such extreme humiliation and bodily exposure. The work suggests that authentic spiritual transformation sometimes requires undergoing humiliation and vulnerability rather than maintaining protective dignity.

The Bare Body as Living Sacrament and Sacred Expression

The bare bodies of the performers in “Crucifix” function as living sacrament—sacred material through which divine presence becomes tangible and perceivable. The body becomes consecrated space where spiritual and material dimensions meet and merge. The audience witnesses not abstract theology but embodied spiritual reality made visible through vulnerable flesh. The sacramental function of the naked body suggests that spirituality emerges through embodied presence rather than remaining confined to conceptual understanding or disembodied spirit.

The performers’ bodies also become textual surface through which suffering and transformation become visible and readable. The audience perceives spiritual process manifesting through physical expression—breathing, movement, stillness, apparent pain. What remains usually invisible—the inner experience of suffering, the spiritual dimensions of crucifixion, the consciousness undergoing transformation—becomes perceivable through the body’s visible manifestation. The flesh becomes language expressing what words cannot communicate.

The sacramental understanding of the naked body also reflects spiritual traditions recognizing embodied presence as primary vehicle for spiritual transmission. Shamanic practices, Hindu tantra, Buddhist meditation traditions—many spiritual frameworks emphasize how consciousness transformation occurs through direct embodied encounter rather than intellectual study. Mukarno’s performance participates in these traditions, suggesting that authentic spirituality requires engaging bodies directly rather than transcending embodiment toward disembodied spiritual realms.

The sacred expression emerging from naked bodies also challenges religious frameworks treating nakedness with shame and requiring concealment. The performance suggests that authentic spirituality would celebrate bodies as worthy of honor rather than treating them as shameful requiring hiding. The naked bodies become assertion that flesh remains sacred—not sinful, not degraded, but fundamentally worthy of respect and reverence. The performance models spirituality emerging when bodies receive honor rather than condemnation.

The Endurance Ritual: 60 Minutes of Embodied Spiritual Practice

The Time Duration as Spiritual Container and Initiatory Experience

The specific 60-minute duration of “Crucifix” creates particular temporality structuring the embodied spiritual experience. The hour-long engagement permits audiences and performers to move beyond initial voyeuristic response toward sustained contemplative participation. The duration permits bodies to surrender habitual defenses, consciousness to shift toward different awareness, collective field to deepen and intensify. The 60 minutes become sufficient time for genuine transformation to occur rather than momentary spectacle dissipating immediately.

The extended duration also mirrors contemplative spiritual practices utilizing time as vehicle for consciousness transformation. Buddhist meditation retreats, Hindu pilgrimage practices, Christian mystical traditions—many spiritual frameworks employ extended time engagement toward facilitating authentic transformation. The 60-minute crucifixion reenactment similarly utilizes temporal extension toward permitting consciousness shift. The audience and performers collectively undergo initiation through the shared temporal container.

The duration also permits the narrative to unfold gradually, revealing multiple dimensions and complexities rather than collapsing meaning into momentary impact. The crucifixion becomes explored through sustained embodied practice rather than abbreviated representation. The performance invites lingering attention—audiences cannot quickly process and dismiss what they witness. The extended engagement permits emotional opening, spiritual awakening, consciousness transformation.

The 60-minute span also connects to historical understandings of crucifixion’s temporal reality. Historical sources suggest crucifixions sometimes lasted many hours—extending suffering across extended time periods. The extended duration honors this historical reality while suggesting that extended suffering demands extended witness. The audience’s sustained presence becomes form of compassionate engagement with the crucified body. The collective witness transforms through the extended temporal engagement.

Movement from Constraint Toward Liberation and Redemption

The 60-minute performance arc likely traces progression from the initiation of crucifixion toward moments of redemption and potential liberation. The beginning phase establishes constraint—bodies bound to cross or cross-like structure, movement restricted, vulnerability exposed. The middle phases deepen engagement with suffering—bodies manifest apparent pain, struggle, endurance. The concluding phases potentially gesture toward redemption and liberation—suggesting transcendence of suffering, transformation through sacrifice, resurrection or spiritual awakening emerging from extreme vulnerability.

This narrative arc mirrors spiritual transformation patterns found across many traditions. The spiritual path typically involves encountering constraint or suffering, moving through the difficulty while maintaining consciousness and commitment, and potentially achieving liberation or awakening at the journey’s completion. Mukarno’s 60-minute crucifixion reenactment becomes lived experience of this fundamental spiritual pattern. The audience witnesses complete cycle rather than isolated moment.

The extended duration also permits exploration of suffering’s transformative potential. Many spiritual traditions recognize suffering as vehicle for spiritual growth rather than merely negative experience to avoid. The extended engagement with suffering-through-crucifixion permits audiences to perceive how consciousness can transform through suffering. The performance suggests that redemption emerges not by denying suffering but by moving through it consciously and completely.

The movement from constraint toward liberation also carries particular resonance for audiences who have survived oppression or suffering. The performance models how liberation becomes possible despite devastating difficulty. The reenactment becomes metaphor for personal and collective liberation from oppression. Viewers witnessing the movement toward liberation potentially access hope and inspiration suggesting their own liberation remains possible.

The Collaborative Creation: Community and Collective Witness

The Ensemble of Performers as Sacred Community

The collaborative structure bringing together Mukarno, Natalia Panfile, Lauren Kelly, and Lola Velvet creates ensemble performance rather than isolated artist displaying suffering. The multiple bodies and voices become necessary elements of the complete narrative. The crucifixion story gains depth through collaborative interpretation—each performer contributing unique perspective and embodied presence toward collective meaning-making. The ensemble structure suggests that spirituality emerges through community formed around shared sacred practice.

The collaboration also honors how the crucifixion narrative fundamentally involves multiple beings. The Gospel accounts describe not merely Christ’s suffering but the presence of disciples, witnesses, perpetrators, and others whose presence shapes the narrative’s significance. Mukarno’s ensemble approach honors this multiplicity while suggesting that contemporary spiritual practice similarly requires community engagement rather than isolated individual practice. The collective performance becomes ritual through which community forms around recognition of shared vulnerability.

The female performers specifically contribute their presence and embodied practice toward the overall work. The inclusion of women as active performers rather than merely representing female figures from the narrative honors women’s spiritual authority and contribution. The collective work becomes opportunity where women and men collaborate as equals in sacred practice. The ensemble structure challenges patriarchal frameworks where men typically occupy positions of spiritual authority while women remain supporting roles.

The collaborative process also reflects the residency context emphasizing collective artistic exploration and mentorship. The ensemble learned together, developed work collectively, contributed individual creativity within collaborative framework. This process mirrors how spiritual communities function—individuals bringing unique gifts and perspectives toward collective spiritual practice. The performance becomes expression of what collaborative spiritual community becomes possible.

The Audience as Participant in Collective Ritual

The presence of audiences witnessing “Crucifix” transforms them from passive spectators into participants in collective ritual experience. The extended 60-minute engagement requires audiences to surrender habitual detachment and open toward genuine encounter with embodied suffering and spiritual narrative. The collective gathering around the performance creates temporary sacred community united around recognition of shared vulnerability and spiritual hunger.

The audience’s witness becomes spiritually significant element rather than incidental accompaniment. Many spiritual traditions recognize that witness transforms meaning—that suffering becomes different when acknowledged and honored through compassionate attention. The audience’s presence, breath, heartbeat, emotional response—all become essential ingredients of the ritual’s spiritual significance. The gathered humans collectively invoke sacred dimension impossible through isolated individual experience.

The audience also potentially undergoes transformation through witnessing. Confronting embodied vulnerability and suffering can trigger opening of consciousness and heart. The extended engagement can shift consciousness toward different awareness. The experience of shared vulnerability with strangers gathered around crucifixion reenactment can generate unexpected compassion and spiritual connection. The performance becomes catalyst for audiences’ own transformation.

The collective witness also creates accountability and honor for the performers. The audience’s presence acknowledges and validates the performers’ courageous embodied practice. The witness suggests “your suffering matters, your vulnerability is seen and honored, your spiritual practice contributes to our collective consciousness.” This recognition of the performers’ sacrifice and vulnerability becomes form of spiritual reciprocity—the audience’s presence becomes gift honoring the performers’ embodied offering.

Religious Framework and Spiritual Reclamation

Engaging Christian Narrative for Contemporary Spiritual Inquiry

Mukarno’s deliberate engagement with the crucifixion—Christianity’s central narrative—reflects the artist’s complex relationship toward religion. The performance demonstrates both commitment to exploring spiritual dimensions of religious narrative and critique of oppressive aspects of religious institutions. The crucifixion reenactment becomes vehicle for reclaiming Christian spirituality from institutional religious control, suggesting that authentic spirituality emerges through embodied practice rather than doctrinal conformity.

The naked performance body engaging the crucifixion narrative directly challenges conservative Christian approaches requiring bodily shame and concealment. The work reclaims the body as legitimate sacred site, suggesting that authentic Christianity would celebrate embodied existence rather than condemning it. The performance models how Christian spirituality becomes deepened rather than compromised through engaging embodied vulnerability and naked truth.

The crucifixion narrative also permits exploration of suffering and redemption—themes central to human spiritual experience regardless of religious background. While specifically engaging Christian narrative, the work addresses universal human concerns about how suffering becomes meaningful and how redemption becomes possible. The performance speaks to anyone struggling with suffering, loss, and the search for meaning and transformation.

The embodied reenactment also honors the crucifixion as foundational story shaping Western consciousness across centuries. The narrative operates at depths beyond doctrinal belief—influencing unconscious psychology, cultural values, artistic expression, spiritual seeking. Mukarno’s performance engages these deep cultural resonances, inviting audiences toward recognizing the crucifixion’s ongoing spiritual significance in contemporary consciousness.

Reclaiming Vulnerability as Sacred Authority and Spiritual Power

The performance suggests that authentic spiritual authority emerges through vulnerable embodied practice rather than institutional credentials or doctrinal positions. The performers’ courageous naked engagement with the crucifixion narrative establishes authority through direct embodied demonstration. The willingness to suffer, to expose vulnerability, to undergo transformation before witnesses becomes most credible spiritual teaching available.

The reclamation of vulnerability as spiritual authority directly challenges dominant frameworks treating vulnerability as weakness requiring correction or concealment. The performance suggests that vulnerability represents authentic human condition and legitimate foundation for spiritual practice. The willingness to acknowledge vulnerability—to expose it publicly, to honor it as sacred—becomes spiritual sophistication and strength rather than failure requiring hiding.

This reclamation also reflects spiritual traditions recognizing that ultimate spiritual realization involves complete opening and surrender. Many traditions describe enlightenment or spiritual awakening involving dissolution of ego boundaries and vulnerable openness toward ultimate reality. Mukarno’s performance suggests that this spiritual openness becomes possible through naked embodied practice. The exposed flesh becomes expression of spiritual maturity and awakening.

The authority emerging through vulnerable embodiment also becomes available to audiences. Witnessing others’ courageous vulnerability invites permission toward acknowledging one’s own vulnerability. The performance suggests that spiritual authority remains accessible to all beings willing to open toward authentic embodied encounter. The spiritual power emerges not through exceptional individuals but through any consciousness willing to engage truth completely and courageously.

Conclusion: Crucifix as Living Sacrament and Collective Spiritual Awakening

Philemon Mukarno’s “Crucifix” (2024) stands as courageous artistic statement about suffering, redemption, vulnerability, and spiritual awakening through 60-minute embodied naked performance. The collaborative reenactment of the biblical crucifixion narrative within contemporary artistic context engages the story’s deepest spiritual dimensions while challenging religious frameworks requiring bodily shame and disembodiment. The naked performers—embodying Christ, Mary Magdalene, Mary, and potential witness figures—create collective ritual permitting audiences to encounter crucifixion narrative as living contemporary spiritual reality rather than historical abstraction.

The performance’s power emerges through its uncompromising commitment to naked embodied truth. The exposed bodies become primary communication medium—transmitting suffering, vulnerability, spiritual seeking, and potential redemption directly through embodied presence. Audiences cannot dismiss or distance themselves from what they witness directly. The extended 60-minute duration permits consciousness transformation impossible through brief spectacle. The collective gathering creates temporary sacred community united around recognition of shared vulnerability and spiritual hunger.

The work demonstrates performance art’s capacity to engage religious narratives in fresh ways honoring their spiritual dimensions while challenging oppressive aspects of religious institutions. The performance models how contemporary spirituality can emerge through embodied artistic practice rather than requiring institutional religious authority. The naked vulnerable bodies become most credible spiritual teachers—not because they possess special knowledge but because they courageously embody truth, suffer authentically, and maintain consciousness throughout vulnerability.

The collaborative structure—including multiple performers, audience witness, and mentorship from experienced performance artists—reflects understanding that spirituality emerges through community rather than isolation. The performance honors how redemption involves relational encounter. The gathered humans collectively invoke sacred presence impossible for isolated individuals. The work suggests that authentic spiritual practice requires community willing to witness, honor, and participate in collective transformation.

Through “Crucifix” and his broader artistic practice, Mukarno affirms the power of naked embodied performance for facilitating profound spiritual consciousness transformation. The vulnerable exposed body becomes most powerful vehicle for spiritual transmission. The reenactment of ancient sacred narrative through contemporary embodied practice bridges past and present, individual and collective, suffering and redemption. The performance leaves indelible impact—on individual consciousness, on cultural conversation about spirituality and embodiment, on collective capacity for recognizing and honoring sacred dimensions of human existence. “Crucifix” endures as powerful reminder that spiritual awakening and redemption remain possible through courageous vulnerable embodied practice and collective sacred witness.

SEO Optimization Notes

Primary Keyword: Crucifix Philemon Mukarno performance
Secondary Keywords: Crucifixion naked performance art, sacred embodied spirituality, Live Art Ireland 2024 performance
Meta Description: Discover Philemon Mukarno’s transformative “Crucifix” performance—a 60-minute sacred reenactment exploring suffering, redemption, and spiritual awakening through naked embodied art.
Title: Crucifix: Philemon Mukarno’s Sacred 60-Minute Naked Performance on Spiritual Awakening