ihung.org

Look, a new post! Despite being quiet for quite an obscene length of time, we are indeed still around and still doing stuff sporadically. But that’s a post for a different time.

I’m writing today to implore all of you to go and support a new CrowdFunding campaign to get a sequel to Stelarc’s fantastic Obsolute Body: Suspensions book printed. For those of you who don’t know, Obsolute Body: Suspensions has been out of print for ages, and was a rather niche run to begin with, meaning that getting your hands on a copy nowadays will run you over $500 for a paperback, and over a grand for the hardbound! Which leads me to this book. It’s a sequel of sorts, since the first book didn’t contain enough of Stelarc’s suspension experiments to sate the current generations appetite for knowledge on body suspensions. This book promises to include more information on Stelarc’s early work, and then build on that with his body suspension experiments since then, such as Ear and Arm, and also his projects with the Wings of Desire folks in Oslo and Dallas.

Speaking of the WoD folks, they are also the masterminds behind PS Media who have worked tirelessly to both engage Stelarc in the modern suspension community as well as to get this book off the ground. If you’ve ever worked with, or seen any of the work that WoD and Pain Solution do, you already know that they set a very high bar in all of their endeavours. This latest book appears to be no different.

So please, if you are into performance art, art history, body modification, body suspension, supporting independent artists, etc, then head over to IndieGoGo and contribute. I’ve not seen the book yet, but I can attest that every other book from PSMedia is gold, and this will certainly raise the standard.

All too often in the suspension world, someone comes up with an idea for a suspension that is amazing but we don’t have the exact right tool for the job. Being the creative family that we are, this situation becomes an episode of MacGyver, which is awesome, however all too often we see this situation unfold in unsafe ways.

A few weeks ago, I showed up to a suspension day and was asked to take care of an 8 point lotus suspension, 4 hooks in the legs, 2 in the back, and 2 in the chest. Hell yeah I want to do this! So, we get Chris cleaned and hooked, which was awesome because it meant working with some old friends, one of whom coached me up my first time. Anyhow, back to Chris, we get him ready to go, and then it’s time to start rigging and I hit a roadblock. The only rigs we have are small rigging plates, which would be fine other than the hooks in the chest. If I’d continued to use a standard bearclaw, he’d have riglines running directly in his face and pressing into his chest and back.

Once I realized that hanging the bear claw in it’s normal vertical orientation, I started trying to use a couple of carabiners to hang it horizontally. Well, none of the carabiners were long enough to really reach a central carabiner without their angles being way too extreme. I then remembered that I brought me a tall aluminum rig that had various holes along the top and bottom edges, and tried the 3 carabiner configuration with it. Not only were the angles too acute, it was remarkably unbalanced side to side. Starting to get frustrated now because the rigging was getting to me and also because Chris was sitting patiently with hooks in all set to go. I decided to use some cord to cradle the rig, which took a few iterations to get right.

This iteration was really close, but it still suffered from the same acute angles problem as I’d run into with carabiners AND I didn’t trust it to not shift front to back once Chris got swinging. At this moment, I remembered working with Oliver back in the day at an old ROP SusCon where he did some fantastic static rigging and wrapped the cord bundles near the carabiner to keep the cords all in place and to tidy them up. Bingo! I cradled the rig with a loop of cord created with a tape knot, looped the two sides of it through a carabiner three times each, and then bound that together with an additional piece of cord to prevent the rig from tilting. From there on out, it was a case of simply running lines to the hooks and getting them balanced, and with that, Chris was airborne.

Pics courtesy of James SantangeloEven though we didn’t have the ideal rig on hand, by using some troubleshooting skills and relying on previous experiences and knowledge, we were able to pull off a great suspension. Chris thoroughly enjoyed it, we had a fantastic time making it happen, and it contributed to an all around fun day.

This article is going to be the first in a short series of posts about my experiences at the 11th annual Wings of Desire Oslo Suspension Convention, which was held over the weekend of 19-22 July 2012.

I went to Oslo, knowing only a few members of Wings of Desire, and that a few members of the North American community would be there, and with the knowledge that I’d be suspending while there. This would be the first time I’ve suspended in “public” in at least 6 years, possibly longer, so I was more than a bit nervous. Once I was at the space, working alongside so many talented practitioners, my anxiety subsided and gave way to excitement and even eagerness. Initially, I’d said I wanted to suspend on Saturday evening, but I changed my mind and decided to suspend earlier in the day. My chosen position being “superman”, since I’ve never done one before and also because it’s a position that really requires giving up control. Most of my more recent (and by recent, I mean “in the last few years”) have been variations on vertical back suspensions or knee suspensions, which allow for me to be in control of most elements of the experience. Not so much with superman, as piercing, rigging and lifting are all in the hands of the team, and even getting off the ground is different as it’s basically “you’re up or you’re not”, no tippy toes, no shoulders still grounded…

I’m not certain who my team was, other than Håvve was my team leader and Allen was there piercing, along with two others. Before we could down to hook placement, I had the pleasure of having most of my back shaved, along with patches on my legs, so that the bandages would stick afterwards. With that out of the way, the discussion as to where the hooks should go started up, and Håvve decided pretty quickly that they should use Sea Demons (the larger of the standard fishing hooks) for me since my skin doesn’t pinch up too well. The thought of receiving ten 6 gauge piercings was a terrifying one, so I expressed my concerns and it was decided that they’d instead use six Sea Demons in my back, and the normal 8 gauge hooks in my legs. Still worrying, but not quite as bad. The moment of truth came and I had the first four hooks all inserted at the same time, three in my back and one in my calf. It burned a little, but wasn’t unbearable. The next set was about the same, but this meant that eight hooks were in, leaving two more to follow. The two remaining, which happened to both be my upper thighs, which is tight skin, that doesn’t pull or separate terribly well, so I knew they’d hurt, and I was right! That didn’t matter though, as I was finished and ready to go.

There was a table already set up for me to climb onto and my rigging was basically all set as well. I did my best to relax and just enjoy A Silver Mount Zion playing through my headphones while the team connected all the hooks to the rig. That set, pressure was applied to balance the lines, at which point, my calves were burning terribly, so Håvve removed some pressure from them; a cycle we repeated twice more. After the third calf adjustment, I felt really good, so I just didn’t tell the person on ropes to stop, and in a few seconds, I was clear of the table, awash in a fresh flood of emotions and endorphins, and was hanging freely.

Photos courtesy of Stephan Strestik

The suspension was a remarkable success, lasting over an hour, and could have easily went for longer, however I had a presentation to give, which had me a little anxious, so down I came. However, I absolutely succeeded in my goal of letting go of control and trusting in a wonderful team of suspension artists. Thank you again to Wings of Desire and all the lovely people I met while in Oslo.

For more pictures from the event, check out the Oslo SusCon Google+ page.