New York City.- The Lyons Wier Gallery is pleased to present “Martin Wittfooth: The Passions” on view at the main gallery (542 West 24th Street) from October 13th through November 12th. “The Passions”, Martin Wittfooth’s first solo show in New York, is a contemporary exploration of sainthood, martyrdom, and religiosity that still dominates the ideological landscape of the modern world, and displays the prerequisite acts most often performed to attain such states of veneration such as violence, self-sacrifice, and suffering. In Western philosophy, “The Passions” refer to strong biologically driven emotional states that seduce one away from reason. Yet the term’s origin is to be found in the Latin word, “passio”, which means, simply, “suffering”. Consequently, the term is connected to the most famous act of martyrdom: the crucifixion of Christ.