Skip to main content
Penitente (from the series Lifelines)
Penitente (from the series Lifelines)
Penitente (from the series Lifelines)

Penitente (from the series Lifelines)

Artist (American, born 1948)
Date1982 (printed 1989)
Mediumplatinum-palladium print
DimensionsImage: 12 11/16 x 16 9/16 in. (32.2 x 42.1 cm)
Support: 17 15/16 x 21 15/16 in. (45.6 x 55.7 cm)
Mat: 20 x 24 in. (50.8 x 61 cm)
ClassificationsPhotograph
Credit LineGift of Ken Terry and Denise Betesh, 2011
Object number2011.17.2
DescriptionImage of antlers massed together into a vertical column atop an image of the high-desert landscape.
eMuseum Notes

In this piece from her series Lifelines, Rubenstein places a vivid, squirming mass of antlers against a backdrop of the sparse, high-desert landscape. The title refers to Los Hermanos or the Penitente Brotherhood, a group of Roman Catholic men in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado. The antlers, taken from dead animals, recall the points of Christ’s crown of thorns and suggest some of the sacrifices and sufferings the artist has encountered in people during her time in New Mexico.

On View
Not on view
Good Luck
Meridel Rubenstein
1982 (printed 1984)
Maze (from the series Labyrinths and Constellations)
Meridel Rubenstein
1984-1987 (printed 1989)
Native Son
Meridel Rubenstein
1982
Good Luck
Meridel Rubenstein
1982 (printed 1984)
Meridel Rubenstein & Ellen Zweig, Portal to Archimedes' Chamber, 1990, palladium prints, steel,…
Meridel Rubenstein
1990-1993
Platinum photo montage of dog
Meridel Rubenstein
1984
Weed, White Sands (from the series Desert)
Joan Myers
1979 (printed 1981)