Today I visited the Colossal Colon. It’s a forty-foot long tunnel, representing a human colon; you can crawl through it, and see all the diseases to which the colon is subject, culminating in full-blown cancer. I had to go because I am hereditarily predisposed to be at a high risk for colon cancer; but mostly because of the sheer perversity of such an anal representation. And indeed, though the purpose of the exhibition is high-mindedly educational–to warn people of the medical risks, and urge them to get tested for colon polyps or cancer–it really best works as a bizarre piece of participatory installation art. Somehow I erased my photo of the entire thing, with me entering it at the upper (intestinal rather than anal) end; so instead I have put up a photo of the repulsive interior.
Colossal Colon
Today I visited the Colossal Colon. It’s a forty-foot long tunnel, representing a human colon; you can crawl through it, and see all the diseases to which the colon is subject, culminating in full-blown cancer. I had to go because I am hereditarily predisposed to be at a high risk for colon cancer; but mostly because of the sheer perversity of such an anal representation. And indeed, though the purpose of the exhibition is high-mindedly educational–to warn people of the medical risks, and urge them to get tested for colon polyps or cancer–it really best works as a bizarre piece of participatory installation art. Somehow I erased my photo of the entire thing, with me entering it at the upper (intestinal rather than anal) end; so instead I have put up a photo of the repulsive interior.