HOOK SUSPENSION
Karada House is collaborating with Luna Duran in organizing Hook Suspension Rituals. We are very happy that we can offer our space for Luna’s artistic and ritualistic vision. On this site you can find the next dates for booking your hook suspension ritual, facilitated by Luna at Karada House.
Book your Hook Suspension Ritual
Luna’s statement about hook suspensions:
We should first acknowledge that flesh suspension is an ancestral practice documented in the rituals of many different tribes of North America as well as Hindu traditions which survive to this day. Many of these traditions were violently interrupted and outlawed by colonial strategies intended to erase indigenous cultural identities. We are not engaging in any reductive or imitative practices which remove spiritual techniques from the cultural context tying closed practices to their cultural heritage and environment. Cultural misappropriation is not welcome in this space.
Although the modern practice of hook suspension was inspired by these practices, we have made a great effort over the years to disentangle the community from this problematic initiation. The practice over the last several decades has been greatly focused on the technical knowledge required to lift people into the air with modern equipment as well as medical knowledge which informs our use of sterile piercing implements and their appropriate use.
My involvement in hook suspension began in 2011 and was very intentionally a spiritual journey that I constructed for myself in order to reconnect with my indigenous ancestry. I learned from a very early age that bloodletting could be seen as a means to practice reciprocity with Pacha, an Andean concept of time/space, also understood to be “Pachamama” meaning Mother Earth. I document my spiritual practice in collaboration with many great artists in fine art photography and currently as a hook suspension artist for theater and performance art as my second career.
As a professional body piercer since 2007 I have been able to combine my spiritual intentions with a modern focus on safety and up to date sterilization practices. I am lovingly involved with the greater Suspension community all over the world and forward the belief that this can be a deeply connective practice whether to oneself or to the people and the environments surrounding us. I would like to collaborate with anyone interested in pursuing this journey in whatever way feels authentic to each individual person seeking to know themselves in their true strength. My practice is not prescriptive and I am not interested in being the architect to anyone else’s journey. I am offering my experience in the fields of safe and sterile piercing, Art, and as a suspendee in service to your vision.
Impressions of a hook suspension facilitated by Luna.
Luna Duran
I have been a professional body piercer for 13 years, being heavily involved in hook suspension for the last 9. I am also a lecturer on Body Art speaking at conferences and events like A.P.P. (Association of Professional Piercers) in the United States, A.P.P.E. (Asociación de Perforadores Profesionales España) in Spain, L.B.P. (Latin American Body Piercers) in Mexico, U.K.A.P.P. (United Kingdom Association of Professional Piercers) in the UK, as well as Wave Gotik Treffen and BMXNET (Body Modification eXchange Network) in Germany. I have also been a founding member of Rope Coven in the Bay Area (USA), a container gathering and a space created for people of oppressed genders, including women, non-binary folks, and trans men. I am also a founding member of Ressurection Rites (USA), a trans- inclusive suspension campout for all women, non-binary, and genderfluid folks. I am bringing my professional as well as community experience to Karada House in order to facilitate hook suspension in a safe space centering the experience on underrepresented folks in the larger hook suspension, kink, and body art communities.
Lunas Website:
lunaduran.com