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"The sight of your own blood, brought forth from your hand, is a violation that you yourself now
control," Ron Athey writes in his online biography.
Continued from Page 41
Kampnagel Theater in Hamburg, Germany. “In
with queer and trans subjects, shot a series of
Polaroids with Athey in 2000 that captured
Joyce, 1 use real and imaged footage of schizophre
nia, disassociation, self-mutilation and mother/
daughter incest,” Athey says. “The rhythm is set
his androgynous St. Sebastian persona. Each
by an EEG pattern, which is echoed by an au
one, blindingly lit and lush in color, is a unique
heels and leaning forward with his ornate cloak
tomatic writer on video and an action painter
on stage.” The climax of the performance comes
when maniacal Mother Joyce, having been
drawn back to expose his lower body, has a long
trapped in a makeshift one-room insane asylum,
string of pearls trailing from his rectum to the
finally smashes through the plasterboard walls
floor. As Opie admits, it’s an homage to Robert
Mapplethorpe’s self-portrait with a whip coming
of her symbolic prison and hangs upside down
before the (presumably traumatized) audience.
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out of his ass, but it’s also in keeping with past
Snapper joined Athey in 2005 for the
Anonymous and Needle-Free
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The title of this piece comes from an essay
Judas Cradle, his first Los Angeles perform
by French writer George Bataille, whom Athey
ance in 10 years. The title refers to a medi
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print. In one of them, Athey, wearing stiletto
*
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work of Athey’s—in particular, Solar Anus.
premiere of their multimedia operatic drama
Monday Nights 5:30 to 7:30
has acknowledged as an influence on his artistic
eval torture device replicated for the show,
philosophy. Gilles Lazare describes the perform
a pyramid-shaped structure on whose point
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ance in his long essay “An Endless Insurrec
Athey sits anally impaled while Snapper inter
tion”: “With an alchemical sun tattooed around
rogates him from an adjacent podium. Their
his anus, Athey proceeds to turn his back on the
multilingual libretto is composed from a mo
audience and pull an Ariadne’s thread of pearls
from inside himself; a defecation of white glob
ules which suggests how base matter digests the
saic of sources including authentic transcripts
opera and author Jean Genet. It concludes
luminous violence of the sun through a scandal
with Athey speaking in tongues, yet another
ous eruption.” In doing so, Athey has taken the
eerie homage to his messed-up childhood.
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from Inquisition hearings, and quotes from
ultimate taboo and turned it on its head: The
In addition to his performance work and jour
place “where the sun don’t shine” has become
nalism, Athey occasionally teaches workshops
the sun itself. Somewhere Fred Phelps just had
on performance art and has been composing
a heart attack.
a memoir based on his Pentecostal upbringing
Solar Anus is included as part of Athey’s star
titled Gifts of the Spirit. Unfortunately, the book
ring role in the Danish gay pom film HotMen
is on the back burner for the time being. “I’ve
CoolBoyz, released in 2000 by Lars von Trier’s
written a huge chunk, but I wasn’t happy with
production company, Zentropa. The film was
writing that type of memoir-based book in my
Portland
nominated for five GayVN Awards (presented
annually to honor work in the gay pornography
spare time,” Athey says. “I’m waiting for an
503.299.9911
971.404.2544
industry), including a Best Solo Performance
nomination for Athey, who also narrates the
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imaginary time when I’ll have focus to give the
writing style some clarity and continuity. ©
2 Gyrlz Performative Arts presents R on A they
Performances of Solar Anus carried Athey
with Samantha Sweeting, Aria Benner and
into the new millennium, during which time
Micah Perry 8 p.m. April 4 at Hippodrome,
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he was also perfecting a theatrical multimedia
315 S.E. Third Ave. Cover is $8.
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performance, Joyce,
VISIT US ONLINE K
in
collaboration
with
soprano/musicologist Juliana Snapper. Joyce
T ony L e T igre likes tea, books, cats and pain.
debuted in February 2002 at the prestigious
E'mail him at anthonyletigre@gmail.com.