With numerous loans, the exhibition takes a cultural-historical look at the body in the Middle Ages and provides inspiration to reflect on our image of the body today.

Every era and society cultivates its own image of the human body. In the Middle Ages, the physical form was something of a cause célèbre. The all-powerful church considered bodily desire sinful, while worshipping the martyred bodies of Jesus and the saints. Meanwhile, in the secular world, aristocrats nurtured their appearance with cosmetic products and by doing sport – while the common people suffered from disease and demanding physical labour. Ultimately, death loomed in everyone’s future as it was omnipresent during the Middle Ages. Dead bodies were cared for and honoured in the hope of resurrection. The exhibition includes many items on loan from within and outside Switzerland and looks back on the human body in the Middle Ages from a cultural history perspective, thereby also raising some questions about how we perceive the human body today.