The Foxhole #4: Eggs Danny Thomas Style

Trigger warnings: Poop, A Nail Through Your Junk, and the Russian Revolution

This week, I’ve been returning to the life and work of Bob Flanagan (1952-1996), the performance artist and masochist. Bob had cystic fibrosis, and was in a longterm D/s relationship, both of which come up in his work a LOT. I’m not going to link to said work because…it’s not for the faint of heart. 

Bob gets mad respect for living openly and unapologetically in a way that most of us don’t have the balls to do. But he also earns it for the questions his work asked about masculinity, disability, and sex: What does it mean to be tough, to be a man? How does our childhood influence our sexuality? Are our kinks a result of nature or nurture? What makes a body beautiful? Why are disabled people infantilized and desexualized? 

Bob had a wicked sense of humor. During one art installation, he nailed his penis and scrotum to a wooden board while singing If I Had a Hammer. He reimagined himself as a superhero–”Supermashochist!”–posed like Superman with a hospital gown as a cape, wearing both an oxygen mask and kinky regalia.