Juan Delgado "Who Are You Entertaining To?"

Juan Delgado, a victim placed directly in front of and below his abuser, is repeatedly struck in the face. Watching this traumatic interaction stirs uneasy feelings for me as a viewer. Fourteen minutes pass and Delgado's breath is noticeably deeper, his face red, glistening with sweat from the repetitive blows. I want to jump into the screen and hit the mysterious abuser back...or shake Delgado and say, "defend yourself!" It is these reactions that make this piece so successful.
Trauma, as Elizabeth Cowie explains in commentary of the work, are both unrememberable and unforgettable experiences. You can think back to when you broke a bone and remember how you reacted to the injury, but you will never physically experience that moment again. The unresolved feeling built by watching Who Are You Entertaining To parallels the unresolve of trauma in general which challenges us as individuals to move on from a wounding experience.
In an article I found, titled "Sex and Violence" by Penelope Harvey and Peter Gow, the writers investigate human fascination with the two subjects. Movies, sports, literature, they are all guilty of incorporating these topics which we are in turn drawn to, as a sort of desire for the "eroticization of domination and the eroticization of the dominated." Delgado being the dominated refuses us the pleasure of striking his dominator back, instead choosing to draw focus to each reaction as he slowly turns his head back into place to be struck again.
I define the generative topic of this piece as: representing the experience of violence/physical abuse. This topic becomes important in my personal studies of the use of art in relation to the process of creating such a representation. In Art Therapy and Children: A Case Study On Domestic Violence by Abha Singh, the writer explains that trauma may cause psychic numbness around the memory. In other words, an abused child may repress memories of being struck by his/her father (much like Delgado is struck in the video). Singh claims that "art is an opportunity for new learning when a gap as existed," when practiced you "enter a transitional place between internal and external reality" and truly form a relationship with your past and how it affects your present self.
This is a difficult topic to bring into the classroom. Like many of the subjects we discussed today including male stereotypes and death, we as facilitators of students growth and discovery of self are restricted by boundaries in the school system. I think these restrictions will be something I always struggle with...As an assignment to this generative topic however, I could bring the focus to a less personal level. I might be able to collaborate with a history teacher and ask the students to represent violent acts they are currently studying..for example the Holocaust or Civil War.  I would urge the students to push beyond the limits of 2D where they might be more inclined to represent a particular violent scene as opposed to the true experience of the abuser, victim, or themselves as a student of the violent act.