- Throw Yourself At The Sun
- 2025
- Kunsthaus Dahlem
Throw Yourself At The Sun is a video-performance that interlaces the myth of Icarus with the real-life story of Richard “Sky King” Russell and ancient Greek bee mythology.
Richard Russell, a ground service agent for Horizon Air, famously stole a commercial airplane from Seattle–Tacoma Airport in 2018. During his unexpected flight, he spoke calmly with air traffic control, insisted he intended no harm, apologized to loved ones, and even executed an advanced aerial maneuver—a full barrel roll—before finally crashing the plane on Ketron Island, Washington.
The performance collages fragments of Russell’s radio communications with shaky eyewitness phone footage, online animations, airport surveillance material, and Fehr’s own recordings.
Central to the piece is a pop song written from two intertwined perspectives: Russell as a contemporary Icarus, and the voice of Icarus’s father Daedalus—mirrored in Captain Bill, the pilot who tried to guide Russell safely back to land. The work also incorporates a short film paying homage to Buster Keaton, expanding the constellation of flight, risk, innocence, and fatal mischief.
A further layer references the myth in which Zeus grants bees a sting for their protection, but warns that using it will cost them their lives. This thread appears in the performance when another performer enters wearing a beekeeper’s suit from the museum’s own beekeeping program.
Performance stills (credit: David Außerhofer)
Video stills