Fakir Musafar
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Roland Loomis (August 10, 1930 – August 1, 2018<ref name=artforum>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>), known professionally as Fakir Musafar, was an American performance artist considered to be one of the founders of the modern primitive movement.<ref>Gauntlet – decorating the Modern Primitive Template:Webarchive</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
LifeEdit
Born Roland Loomis, he claimed at age 4 to have experienced dreams of past lives which, along with his anthropological studies, influenced his interests in body modification.<ref>Voices from the Edge (1997), David Jay Brown & Rebecca McCLen Novick</ref><ref name="autogenerated1">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> He served in the army during the Korean War,<ref name="autogenerated1"/> and was first married for a short time in the 1960s.<ref name="autogenerated1"/> In 1966 or 1967, he first performed a flesh hook suspension, inspired by his viewing of anthropological works.<ref name=MP>Vale, V. and Andrea Juno (1989) Modern Primitives. RE/Search, San Francisco. Template:ISBN</ref> In 1977, he gave himself the name Fakir Musafar.<ref name="autogenerated1"/>
In the 1985 documentary Dances Sacred and Profane, he was shown walking while wearing a device that pressed many small skewers into his upper body, and hanging from a tree by hooks in his chest, in his modified versions of other cultures' sacred ceremonies.<ref name="autogenerated1"/> He was an extra ('Man in hotel room') in Die Jungfrauen Maschine (The Virgin Machine) in 1988,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and in 1991, he appeared in My Father Is Coming as Fakir.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> He was featured in the 1989 book Modern Primitives,<ref name="autogenerated1"/> which documented, propagated, and became influential in the modern body modification subcultures.
In 1990, he married Cléo Dubois.<ref name="autogenerated1"/> From 1992 until 1999, he published the magazine Body Play and Modern Primitives Quarterly,<ref name="leathermuseum">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> which focused on body modification topics such as human branding, suspension, contortionism, binding,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and modern piercing culture.<ref>Body Play #4, 1992, "The Unique Piercings of Erik Dakota"</ref> He led "Fakir Intensives" training workshops on these topics in San Francisco.<ref>Voices from the Edge (1997), David Jay Brown & Rebecca McCLen Novick</ref>
Illness and deathEdit
In May 2018, Loomis announced on his website that he was suffering from terminal lung cancer.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> He died on the morning of 1 August 2018.<ref>Slotnik, D. E., "Fakir Musafar, Whose ‘Body Play’ Went to Extremes, Dies at 87", The New York Times, Aug 13, 2018.</ref> His death was initially announced in a public Facebook post by his wife Cléo Dubois, and later confirmed by an obituary in Artforum.<ref name=artforum/>
TributesEdit
The Leather Archives and Museum, founded in 1991,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> once featured an exhibit about Musafar.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> In 1993, he received the Steve Maidhof Award for National or International Work from the National Leather Association International.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> In 2019, he was inducted into the Leather Hall of Fame,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> and he is also an inductee of the Society of Janus Hall of Fame.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> UC Berkeley's Bancroft Library and the Association of Professional Piercers also have large archives of his work in photography, published writings, workshops, and BodyPlay magazines. His memorial bench in Byxbee Park in Palo Alto reads "Body is the door to Spirit".
BibliographyEdit
- Fakir Musafar: Spirit + Flesh, Arena Editions, 2004, Template:ISBN
See alsoEdit
- Domination & submission (BDSM)
- Risk-aware consensual kink
- Sadomasochism
- Safe, sane and consensual
- Sexual fetishism
NotesEdit
ReferencesEdit
- Biography
- Body Modification E-zine interview Template:Webarchive
- National Geographic documentary Taboo
External linksEdit
- Excerpt of interview - Discusses modern primitives, from RE/Search