Barb Macek | The Poetical Anamnesis
The Poetical Anamnesis / PA is a technique to investigate the existential dimension of autoimmune diseases. It conceptualizes the autoimmune body as a modified and therefore poetic body. The symptoms of the disease are read as signs of an organism transforming into a poetical means of world modification.
The application of the PA results in a lyrical series: With every new poem the patient is created as a transient poetical formation; new information emerges and becomes comprehensible, and the result is a gain of meaning on the aesthetic as well as on the medical and the personal side.
The crow is the agent poétique or third agent within the PA. It is a mythical messenger with the ability to wander between the worlds. In a hospital environment it is conspicuously misplaced – challenging the clinical environment, inviting a change of perspectives, inviting transgressions.
