The phenomenology of bloody disruption. In: The Phenomenology of Blood in Performance Art

This chapter introduces part 3 of The Phenomenology of Blood in Performance Art. It establishes the disruptive potential of blood in performance art through a phenomenological and queer theoretical lens. Here Bacon argues that blood—whether present, absent, or symbolically evoked—functions as a radical intervention that unsettles normative assumptions of identity, embodiment, and communal experience. Drawing on phenomenology, crip theory, and queer activism, Bacon positions blood as a site of social commentary, resistance, and shared survival.
Engaging with Elisabeth Hsu’s critique of “meaningful pain” in cultural rituals, Bacon challenges the historical privileging of cis-male suffering in performance art and proposes an expanded framework that centres the lived experiences of marginalized communities. Through a queer phenomenology, blood is reinterpreted as a tool for disorienting the status quo, making visible epistemic violence, and fostering radical collective care. This queering of normativity extends to considerations of pain, endurance, and communal witnessing, positioning the bleeding body as an agent of social transformation.
Bacon references key artistic interventions, including Regina José Galindo’s ¿Quién puede borrar las huellas? (2003), in which the artist walked barefoot through Guatemala City leaving behind bloody footprints as a protest against military violence. This action, performed during a workday lunch break, exemplifies how blood disrupts public consciousness, transforming everyday spaces into sites of political resistance. Through such acts, blood becomes a conduit for multiplicity, unsettling essentialist notions of selfhood and opening possibilities for collective becoming.
By situating blood within a phenomenological framework, Bacon highlights its power to collapse the boundaries between artist, audience, and historical trauma. This chapter ultimately highlights that performance art’s engagement with blood produces an enduring disorientation—one that ruptures hegemonic structures and reconfigures both individual and communal perception.