Gandu

just between us

Shawn’s final project from his Fine Art degree at Edinburgh University focused on the anus in pre-colonial and colonial India. ‘Gandu: views of the casstle’ was borne out of this research, focusing on Shawn’s own body as it challenged the ways in which we view queerness as unclean and wrong by centring on the anus as an image of perversity. Interrogating the gayness and the femininity through which the anus is so denigrated, ‘Gandu’ encourages us to consider the ways we tie body to sex to oppression. Posing it as a question to the viewer, we are invited to view, photograph and even touch the metaphorical arsehole as we ponder why we ever thought it so dirty and wrong to begin with.

Now, ‘Gandu’ hangs proudly in Shawn and Ellie’s flat. Outside the institution and amongst friends and family, the anus has become a household object. Still on display, much of the taboo and shock factor of it has faded into appreciation and understanding for those of it who see it often. ‘Gandu’ is almost a portrait in its home, depicting too the person loved on the other end of the anus.