ABSTRACT
This chapter charts some of the reinventions of La Casati’s body and her performance of Self as an expression, or unification, of her inner and outer states. Hers is a body that refused to follow history, and defies categorization, yet was constructed and transmogrified with clear goals in mind. Luisa Casati simultaneously became the embodiment of her age through her representation in art and literature at the same time as constructing a character beyond space and time. The forms that she took fall into three broad categories: her appearances as a created persona, her reinvention as divine or otherworldly; and adopting non-human guises like animals or planetary bodies. One of the key elements of Casati’s performance of Self that will be explored here is how she incorporated existing bodies and stories into her own. By reviving old gods or re-envisioning new ones, she created links between herself and the figures that she became, as well as to spaces that she inhabited. These metamorphoses have in turn made her a muse for contemporary celebrities, artists and performers, creating what could also be described as a history of the body (her body) and her reincarnations within contemporary culture and sub-cultures.
