Koes Staassen: Dissolution
“Stripping naked is the decisive action. Nakedness offers a contrast to self-possession, to discontinuous existence, in other words. It is a state of communication revealing a quest for a possible continuance of being beyond the confines of the self. Bodies open out to a state of continuity through secret channels that give us a feeling of obscenity. Obscenity is our name for the uneasiness which upsets the physical state associated with self-possession, with the possession of a recognised and stable individuality. Through the activity of organs in a flow of coalescence and renewal, like the ebb and flow of waves surging into one another, the self is dispossessed, and so completely that most creatures in a state of nakedness, for nakedness is symbolic of this dispossession and heralds it, will hide; particularly if the erotic act follows, consummating it.”
– Georges Bataille, Erotism Death & Sensuality (p.17, 1957)
Dissolution
There is great power in ‘active passivity’, in surrendering to our shared desires.
Don’t we all want to dissolve into something greater than ourselves?
Our surrender means the dissolution of our individuality.
One is active, violent and invading while the Other receiving and allowing for a merging.
Together we are present, physically and mentally tuned in, connected.
I am taken by the image of the passive male form.
These bodies surrender to our gaze but are not threatened by it.
I desire and imagine and fantasize
and ultimately feel ready to get to work-
leading to a proposition;
“I confess, I want you to undress.”
KS
June 2017