It started as a pseudo-scientific experiment we could exploit through film and photograph.
It involved two pig heads procured from the public market being exposed to different methods of trauma. Which method would ravage the head faster than the other? What would the results be?
The first head: burned in a ceremonial pyre. Results: Crispy black char, took a rather long time, held shape from skull which would not burn. Smelled reluctantly of pork.
The second: Boiled in water, soaked in acid. The results: (Maybe I am confused here, maybe the first head was soaked in acid and burned in fire.) But what of the boiled head? Mushy, intact but gelatinous, very strong boiling meat smell pervading the kitchen. I mean lab.
The charred head was posed and photographed and eventually buried, having nothing else to say that we could hear. The boiled head, the watery head, was dissected by hand and studied intently; snout, ears, cheeks fatty and squishy.
At this time, the reality of dismemberment became oppressive. What kind of appalling hipster lessons were we learning? Is abasement for pleasure cloaked in science any more palatable? When one partner held the severed snout up to her face and snorted through it, I began to laugh hysterically, falling to the ground, abandoning myself to the surreal horror of the image.
And the original plan, the plan before the science experiment, for securing a pig head was to feature it in a parade; by itself, exalted and proud, resting in wagon, pulled by and traveling amidst the freakish participants we knew ourselves to be.
CELLOPHANE 