MONA HATOUM, DEEP THROAT, 1996
“Mona Hatoum has set the table for us with this artwork, Deep Throat, from 1996. The installation includes a table, roughly 3 feet square and just over 4 feet high, covered in a tablecloth with a single place setting and wooden chair in front of it. The chair faces away from us, pulled out slightly from the table, as if we’ve been invited to sit facing the gallery wall at a slight angle. Despite having enough room for four people around the table, this is a setting for one.
The armless chair is a light brown color with a solid wood seat. Its thin legs support an arched rung connecting the front and back legs beneath the seat. The chair back has three thin, arched rails stacked from its base about an inch apart, topped by a thicker backrest.
The table is covered with a square white tablecloth patterned with white leaves in its weave, which hangs down each side, leaving only the bottom of the light brown table legs exposed. If we were to sit at this table, our knees would brush against the tablecloth as we pulled in our chair.
A topper linen or large cloth napkin of the same fabric is laid over the tablecloth at an angle, forming a diamond shape against the square of the table. It has been unfolded, with clear crease lines still visible. At this angle it doesn’t quite cover the entire table surface, creating a small triangle at each corner exposing the underlying tablecloth. This triangle shape is echoed in the corners of this smaller cloth, which hang a few inches off the center of each edge of the table.
The simple table setting includes one round white dinner plate with a silver four-pronged fork placed to its left and a silver knife on its right, its blade facing inward toward the plate. A tall empty drinking glass is positioned on the table at the upper right of the plate.
Upon closer inspection, not quite noticeable until looking down on the table, a color video projection is centered on the plate. It fills the circular bottom, perfectly round, leaving about an inch around the rim of the plate where it flares slightly upward, as if we’ve just been served soup with the edges of the plate wiped clean.
The video playing on a 5-minute loop depicts the full journey through an upper gastrointestinal tract, from the point of view of our food. Like footage from an endoscopy, the camera slowly squeezes through the esophagus, the tissue lining bright and slick with delicate veining. The video continues on repeat, over and over, tunneling deeply through this throat, the entire digestive system, and back up. The pristine formal table arrangement inviting us to dine on food as a familiar comfort is a stark contrast to the graphic animalistic reminder of how it will pass through our body.
The artwork’s title, Deep Throat, in addition to referencing the physicality of the work and the video footage, also references the mysterious informer from the Watergate scandal and a pornographic movie starring Linda Lovelace. Both phenomena brought to public attention things generally meant to be kept secret or private.
Why is there discomfort in watching a typically private and hidden bodily process made public against the backdrop of a table setting—especially when this process is so common to the human experience? Perhaps Hatoum has left us with other questions too. Why not include a spoon, the easiest utensil to shovel food down our throats? Why is the table set for one?” - Guggenheim Audio Description