| The worship of relics, a contemporary art ahead of its time? |
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p>From the early centuries of their history, Christians preciously preserved relics of their martyrs. Bones, clothing, objects touched by the holy figure, each material vestige was said to contain a part of the virtus (life force) of he who was venerated. Therefore relics were exhibited at festivals and they were expected to give signs, even heal or exorcise. In the Middle Ages, relic worship took on immense proportions, giving rise to trafficking and the manufacture of false relics. From holy relics of the Christ (blood, clothing, pieces of the Cross) to relics of the saints, the principle is to exhibit "remains" and to let them "act".
In a certain manner, it is the same in Christian Boltanski’s art: relics are no longer those of saints, but vestiges of anonymous people, traces of strangers, with which it seems to be a question of communicating. In this way Boltanski cites Roland Barthes speaking of photography: "A photo is literally an emanation from the referent. From a real body which was there, proceed radiations which ultimately touch me, who am here; the duration of the transmission is insignificant; the photograph of the missing being will touch me like the delayed rays of a star.” What "happens" therefore escapes any rational reduction: it is a matter of structuring the vanished body and eternal presence around a certain idea of the exhibition, a way of making manifest which opens the door to emotion. 
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