Qualis artifex pereo ? translated What an artist the world loses in me, was the dying words of the infamous Roman emperor Nero. The phrase here marks what Bo I Cavefors and Martin Bladh through their performance-series The Theatre of the Decadence of Cruelty for several years have manifested: the close proximity between staged debauchery and oppressive violence transformed through artistic self-exploration; how humiliation can be handled when converted into enjoyment, sexual absolutism and a strict acceptation of its most profound consequences: sperm, blood and the crack of the whip; and in the end, the question: what is sensation in itself? One answer that is presented in this work is that sensation is a violent physical overload, an attack on the nervous system best handled completely naked, when one is bleeding and disappearing into sexual ecstasy.

STYX förlag presents
QUALIS ARTIFEX PEREO - a book and a DVD.

The book includes:
? a manifesto
? essays by the artists
? in-depth interviews:
Cavefors on Cavefors by Johannes Flink
Bladh on Bladh by Peter Sotos
discussing the nature of their art and their drives
? 9 color collages by M.Bladh
? a poem by M.Bladh
intersected by a text amalgam
based on works of Georges Bataille
? original action scores for the performance pieces
? the work INJURY

The DVD includes two performance pieces:
QUALIS ARTIFEX PEREO
(40 min) performed and filmed in Malmö, 8th of June 2008.
Actors: Bo I. Cavefors, Martin Bladh, Erica Li Lundqvist, Johanna Rosenqvist.
Film: Aryan Kaganof.
African Noise Foundation in association with Grymhetens Teater Dekadens
Music: Martin Bladh
Sound engineer:
Mikael Oretoft

QUALIS ARTIFEX PEREO ? FINIS
(27 min) performed and filmed in Norrköping, 12th of June 2009.
Actors: Bo I. Cavefors, Martin Bladh, Johan Adolphi, Mikael Oretoft.
Film: Peter Andersson,
Lars Bosma
Music: Martin Bladh

plus the extra feature
INSULT - a video work
by Martin Bladh (15 min)