Fasting and Research




Hunger Artists: Spectacles of Fasting
By Randi Fredricks

The term “hunger artist” has had a broad range of definitions, including political fasters, suffragettes and the Irish nationalists. A stricter definition, which will be used here, is narrower in scope and limited to those whose fasting is intended as a type of a spectacle or carnival-like act to attract public attention. This type of fasting is transformative in a manner similar to performance art.

Throughout history, men and women have fasted with the strict intent of garnering attention. For example, the female saints had contemporaries who fasted for attention. Female hunger artists who earned a living fasting included Martha Taylor in the 1600s, and Sarah Jacob and Ann Moore in the 19th century (De Somer, 3). When their stories of fasting for years at a time seemed incredulous, the women were routinely investigated to determine if they had been eating. Anne Moore, a woman in her late 40s who began fasting in 1813, claimed to have fasted for five consecutive years (p. 32). Her story circulated in newspapers, reports, books and medical journals and her home was a site of mass pilgrimage (Brumburg, p. 57). As with the case of most hunger artists, Moore was studied by physicians and scientists hoping to expose her as a fraud (Gooldin, p. 33). In Moore’s case, as with a number of other hunger artists, it was allegedly discovered that she had cheated and ate food.

One of the most culturally influential hunger artists of all time became a hunger artist somewhat accidentally. In September of 2003, magician and stunt performer David Blaine underwent a 44-day public water-only fast while suspended 30 feet in the air above the River Thames in London in a clear 3-foot by 3-foot by 7-foot Plexiglas box. The case had an internal web cam so that the event could be closely observed. During the event, Blaine drank approximately 4 liters of water per day and claimed to have lost 54 pounds (Korbonits, p. 2306). The stunt had the flavor of performance art gone awry when spectators taunted Blaine with food, pelted him with eggs, shot golf balls at him and tortured him with laser pens. At one point, spectators below goaded him by frying fast food as he dangled above. Meanwhile, two young women flashed their breasts, adding an even more freakish quality to the event. Another man was arrested on criminal charges after disabling the water feed into Blaine’s box (Lawson, 4). According to a spokesman for Blaine, he was attempting to complete “the most extreme exercise in isolation and physical deprivation ever attempted” ( 4). Instead, he succeeded in becoming the most bizarre hunger artist in modern history—possibly ever. His stunt was truly a global transformational event, as demonstrated by the manner in which it polarized opinions around the world. It turned Britain into a hostile, angry, taunting mob that attacked not only Blaine, but America as well for spawning him. The Scotsman newspaper reported that a protester was heard shouting, "Go home David, go back to America. We don’t want you" ( 7). The Scotsman article was a scathing condemnation of Blaine, his stunt, and American values. The Chicago Tribune retorted, "Brits have no respect for David’s high art" ( 6). Such international controversy most served to transform the public paradigm of fasting, but not necessarily in a positive way.

Hunger artists have frequently appeared in carnival settings on public display. The most well-known literature about hunger artists is the short story The Hunger Artist by Frank Kafka, written in 1922. The story opens with a description of a hunger artist who spends all of his time on public display in a cage starving. He is described as proudly displaying his protruding ribs to an attentive crowd (Russell, p. 4-6).

A hunger artist is a performance artist, who—by definition—needs an audience. Like all artists, the hunger artist is seeking to transform his audience by affecting them with his art. Fasting is the medium the hunger artist uses to express himself.

With hunger artists, as with any other approach to fasting, there is always the potential for the occurrence of an eating disorder. The chances of this type of transformation happening may be reduced with proper support and supervision.

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Randi Fredricks is a Naturopathic Psychotherapist with a Doctorate in Naturopathy and a Masters in Psychology. She sees clients at her office in San Jose, California. She can be reached at 800-957-5655 or you can contact her online. This article is an excerpt from Randi Fredricks' book Fasting: An Exceptional Human Experience. Copyright © 2009. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems.










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