CROWLEY'S INFERNO - WOODVALE CREMATORIUM WHERE ALEISTER CROWLEY'S BODY WAS BURNED

Crowley's Inferno, shown above, is a film I made of heat rising from bodies being cremated at Woodvale Crematorium in Brighton, England, where Aleister Crowley's body was cremated on the 5th of December, 1947.

“the wickedest man in the world”

Edward Alexander Crowley (12 October 1875 – 1 December 1947) AKA Aleister Crowley was a notorious English occultist who died in Hastings and was cremated at Brighton Woodvale Crematorium.

No one knows what happened to his ashes - it is rumoured that they were spread at sea -- presumably in Brighton or Hastings. Another rumour states that they were sent to Crowley’s spiritual successor Karl Germer - who took over as the head of Crowley’s Ordo Templi Orientis cult - and who buried them in his New Jersey garden.

I gained access to the Woodvale Crematorium records and found Crowley’s ashes were “Taken away” by a certain L. Wilkinson on the 5th of December, 1947, after a Black Mass had been performed in Crowley’s honour.

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Crowley’s Inferno is an exploration of time and space. It depicts the crematorium where “the wickedest man in the world” - as he was dubbed by the press - Aleister Crowley’s body was cremated. It is still in use, and continues to billow out large quantities of heat from its smoke stacks.

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Following are images of the cremation records to which I was given access at the Woodvale Crematorium records office.