For three years Dr Paul Koudounaris, a specialist in Baroque culture and lector at major universities in Los Angeles, travelled the world to document various religious shrines decorated with human bones, crypts and remains from the sixteenth and seventienth centuries.
He visited about seventy different glorious locations in four continents, most of them not open to public and never been photographed before. All these amazing images that offered various unusual experiences to the author, the attendance of an exorcism, the attack of a monk and his arrest by the Austrian police among them, are gathered in his latest book titled The Empire of Death, published by Thames & Hudson. In 224 pages, the richly illustrated edition uncovers a full essay on architecture masterpieces, impressive chandeliers made by human bones and jewel-encrusted mummies, during an era that death was not considered a taboo.
