cult baby – excerpt chapter I: monster prayers

We hold each other while we break away. Don’t let go, MOTHER. You are not with us, I know, but please hold me. Stories of Catholic power and submission, of neglect, an Early Modern rebellion, met with extreme violence, dating back to the witch mass murders in the lands I call home. An excruciating New Modernity you got there, FATHER. My Modernity - traces of a sisterhood. Source material of scornful trials salvaged stories of what, in today’s age, would be called a feminist uprising. In my village, Schutterwald, Anna Katherina Sütterlin, carrying the literal name of my great-grandmother, raised up a band of women, girls, persons, aged fourteen, against patriarchal violence. So it begins, she cast embers in the face of submission. July 1557 they all burned. Sisters in name. History is slippery, though. (1) So we pray:

The Monster’s Prayer

our mother, who art in heaven
hallowed be thy name
thy kingdom, come
thy will, be done
on earth as it is in our designated hell
give us this day, give us all days to come, wrath and cohesion
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive, if retributed, who trespass against us
and lead us into freedom,
do away with good and evil,
as we are ever fluid
for our kingdom, and the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever i am monster
amen (2)

Anna, Anna Katharina, Franziska, Cornelia, Lydia, Christina, Anna, Anna Katharina, Franziska, Cornelia, Lydia, Christina, Anna, Anna Katharina, Franziska, Cornelia, Lydia Christina, Anna, Anna Katharina, Franziska, Cornelia, Lydia, Christina, Anna, Anna Katharina, Franziska, Cornelia, Lydia, Christina, Anna, Anna Katharina, Franziska, Cornelia, Lydia, Christina

“As she lies dying in a dark alleyway
Her lips, ruby red
And her eyes were morning green
But she whispered to me "Come closer, come closer"
And as I knelt down beside with her dying breath
She said to me:
I'll wait for you, forever and ever, and ever, and ever.” (3)

…

(1) based on authentic source material, found and archived at Marchivum Mannheim, Germany (city archive). But you have to trust me.
(2) freely referencing Matthew 6:9-13 English Standard Version Revision 2016 (ESV).
(3) Song Lyrics, Light Asylum: Bruno Coviello Jr, Shannon Funchess. "Dark Allies." In In Tension, Emerald Tide Music, 2011.

 

 

You pull me under,
into lethal rivers
we float through
the flames

“Say three Hail Marys, turn around” (4)

My ancestry lies heavy on my tongue.
Bloodlines run deep.
Durch den dunklen dunklen Wald (5), we walk
hands clenched, im dunklen dunklen schutterwald.

Across centuries, we walk.
Hands clenched, we sink, drift away.
Hold ourselves up
to be found again.

In life
and in death
I become invisible
am almost
disappeared.

my breath
is still

here

…

(4) Light Asylum, 2011.
(5) Wald is German for woods, my hometown, located in between France and the Black Forest. It carries the name Schutterwald, which is a literal translation of the river Schutter by the woods, shutter that continues to birth and bury me.

…

Pray with me here: 

 

…

Copyright & Context

 

Monster Prayers is an excerpt from the first chapter of the ongoing artistic research project cult baby (2023 –). The work layers a multitude of themes, motifs and storylines, both authentic and fictional, (auto)biographical and historical and engages with queering history, cultural and bodily pain as well as the resonances of transgenerational trauma in a patriarchal culture.

Built as a hybrid concert-performance format for three performers, the most recent version foregrounded a Catholic narrative and was shown at zeitraumexit, Mannheim on July 26, 2025.

Interviews are still on, if you got a story to tell, my dms are always open @nana.del.gray or mailto@christinabauernfeind.de

(c) Nana Bauernfeind in collaboration with

Sebastian Horn / Sound Artist // they have carried cult baby with love and care and continue to amplify its voices

Christina Bergemann / art-historian, feminist curator // sister in name, helps us understand cult baby and thereby beds it in the warmest of contexts as storms gather

Lola Yolanda Zbornik / co-performer // sister, woman that holds cult baby, so it can be fluid

Hannah Uszball / Media artist, performance, installation // fellow witch who gave i am monster a multi-dimensional form as a visual artist

Beata Anna Schmutz / Nationaltheater Mannheim Germany  // motherly director of Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern, collaborative artistic research and deliverance of a family of twin cult babies with performative experiments

Theater Performance Kunst RAMPIG / artistic research, performance, installation, November 2023 Mannheim // a premature cult baby grew into the site-specific performance and installation Das Mädchen mit den Schwefelhölzern

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Christina Bauernfeind is an artistic researcher and performance artist specializing in queer contemporary photography, installation and performance. Their work explores identity, intersectional equality and the deconstruction of naturalized narratives through collaborative, site-specific and performative (sound) installations. They design (queer)feminist educational formats for institutions and independent artists. Holding a German Staatsexamen in Philosophy, English Literature, Linguistics and Art Theory with a focus on queer aesthetics, they have curated community based exhibitions and are part of the exhibition jury of Queer Festival Heidelberg, publishing Deeply Human – Global Queer Photography with Kettler Verlag in 2024.

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Aus der Reihe Hexengeschichten initiert von Judith Kisner anlässlich der Ausstellung •// ✿ //• Anna Bochkova und Judith Kisner (20. März 2025 – 6. April 2025) im Kunstverein GastGarten.