This montage of two sequences proposes a set of dialectic oppositions. Open shows the artist masturbating with a tomato. This residual symbol of femininity or fantasy symbol represents the interweaving of two opposites in the definition of a masculine mode of sexuality which Close then specifies: this second sequence presents the artist plastering the crack in his buttocks and materializes through self-referential action the refusal of homosexuality. This refusal of the similar here introduces Vito Acconci's conception of individual structuring in the opposition of difference, of heterosexuality.

But paradoxically, although the objects used in both the first and second acts describe a number of qualities attributed respectively to the feminine (round, red, liquid) and the masculine (solid), the other, whether man or woman, remains physically absent.

Body art is defined by the artist's action on his own body, by considering a human element common to others in the form of one's own and in a relationship with oneself. But this individual space supposedly closed in on itself highlights otherness - although absent from the action, the artistic sense of the term - as a structuring element of the psyche and identity.

In its relation to the subject dealt with, onanism, there is narrative interference set up by the emotion provided through the rhythm and details of the action filmed in real time. Open-Close aggressively thrusts the intimate into the public domain.

Thérèse Beyler