the masticator: confront your repulsion

By sarahendren

Nov 3, 2010

Takehito Etani’s Masticator anatomizes the physical laboriousness of chewing. This video shows it in action—counting out each movement.

Made of pig skin, human bones, and electronics, it’s like an exoskeletal medical lesson. Like a physical system, unzipped and turned inside-out.

I like this analog-digital hybrid form for a bunch of reasons, but I really like that it opens up the animality of the body-machine. I’ve written about body horror elsewhere here—and this is a revealing look at the ways we hide the mundane facts of our physical processes, especially that of drool—of spilled fluids, messy processes, lack of control. (Edit: Isn’t it interesting that drool holds none of the transgressive appeal of blood, urine, other body fluids?)