Based off a homophobic Bataille essay — L’Anus Solaire (1931) — which draws the erect penis as the sun, and the anus as the nighttime, attracted to each other but unable to exist together, Ron Athey’s performance work aims to queer Bataille’s theory. After pinning his face and head into a crown, Athey proceeds to fuck himself with a dildo attached to a pair of high heels, eventually releasing a string of pearls from his anus.
The work, like much of the Connecticut born artist’s work, aims to place a queer reading on a homophobic canon. In Solar Anus, Athey uses self-harm, blood, and his ass-hole to honour the anus as a weapon of power among homosexuals, while also profiling and representing the suffering associated with anal penetration and blood in the wake of the HIV pandemic of the 80s. Athey’s work aims to both plunder and excoriate the shames and harmful associations inbuilt around anal penetration and gay sex. It’s unflinching, unnerving, but enthralling and effective.