From "Sally Mann, in Her Golden Hour, Faces Fresh Culture Wars/One of America’s finest memoirists, in photos and in prose, is at the peak of her powers in 'Art Work'— and wondering if her pictures will survive" (NYT)(free-access link, so you can see some of her photos, not the seized photos, and read the whole story).
"In her attic, Mann stared at a stack of the 150 unexhibited 'Black Men' prints, wrapped in opaque plastic. Downstairs, we clicked through scans of them: forearms, backs, hands folded, prayerlike. A photograph is two things, Roland Barthes said: what it says to the world and what it says to you. Mann has found herself hounded by that first way of seeing. As artworks, Mann’s 'Black Men' are sumptuous studies of the male body which revel in the quirks of wet-plate collodion, an antique photographic process. But without the story behind them, the context, they could seem nameless abstractions. 'Either the "Black Men" or the pictures of the children,' Mann said, 'I just didn’t see that it should be so big a deal. But you know, I’m acclimated now to the cultural gestalt, the moment, whatever the word is. I don’t agree with it, but I get it. Whereas before I didn’t even get it.'"
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38 comments:
An artist can do things the rest of you’ll go to jail for.
Pedophilia is a lucrative liberal art that resists social progress. #NoJudgment #NoLabels
I think most people who are not mentally disturbed agree that child pornography is a bad thing. But who gets to draw the line between what is porn and what is art? I cannot think of a case where the police intervened to declare art — photos or paintings, either one — as actually being pornography and las enforcement did not get their asses handed to them in court. It would be good if there were hard and fast lines, but no one has figured out where and how to draw them.
Another Alice Munro
She knew exactly what she was doing. Publicity of photos of naked children versus publicity of photos of clothed children.
Awful, manipulative, person.
The concern is that somebody may be getting his rocks off. Otherwise it's art. For example the Christ child art is except from that because getting rocks off doesn't seem possible.
It's also why women are okay in daycare but men aren't. Women don't have rocks.
“The concern is that somebody may be getting his rocks off.“
Sorry, that’s not the concern. The concern is that children will be harmed through sexual abuse. The concern is that allowing photos of naked children in a museum will encourage the perception that exploiting children is permissible. And let’s face it those children were already exploited by their mother. There is no need to make that exploitation public.
Women don't have rocks.
The vast number, the overwhelming number of National Education Association Union rapists who have been arrested in the past 10 years suggests that women do indeed have rocks they require children to get off on.
By the way, I'm not alerting Google by clicking ANY of the links in this post.
The concern is that allowing photos of naked children in a museum will encourage the perception that exploiting children is permissible.
Which is why my children would never be there. The hard part is whether a free society can limit art and still be a free society. I would prefer people be so against it that the artist would be shamed into not doing it, but I am not sure I want legal involvement. (for the museum level work, not the sexualizes exploitive part.)
Biden in shower with daughter?
Children cannot rationally, legally offer consent, so additional, stricter scrutiny is warranted until they evolve to a mature state.
What other ancient practices are no longer politically congruent? Human rites? Semantic change.
“The hard part is whether a free society can limit art and still be a free society.”
You folks are so concerned about free societies so let’s strike a bargain. Any museum that displays the Charlie Hebdo cartoon can then also display anything it damn well pleases.
I see the museum display of the photographs as being exploitative, and I think the grand jury reached the right decision. I think both can be true, and Roland Barthes explains why.
What about societies where children run around naked? Are they exploited? The idea of exploited is tied to a guy somewhere getting his rocks off. Otherwise, exploited how.
Lileks at first put up ordinary pics of his baby daughter. People wrote in and cautioned him that perverts might be looking at them.
Lileks expected people to be looking at the pics. Just not perverts.
I suspect you are just trolling rhhardin, but I'll waste my time this once.
How much money did Mann get from the Museum for displaying the pictures of her children? How much were the children paid for being the model? If she gave them nothing, didn't she exploit them? At any point, did my questions cause you to have an orgasm?
There was Viet Nam napalm girl. Is that still around? The criteria have certainly changed since then.
Children run around their home naked. Taking photos of them when they are not old enough to give consent and showing them off is exploitation of the trust that every child extends to every adult and particularly to their parents.
That's a commercial use restriction. I think can only be used if the role is a generic member of the public and not a particular person, as far as law goes. No moral restriction in it except it's taken in a public view context.
Every time we get excited about something, we end up being insane about it. How many of us have a box of photos in the house going back generations that includes photos of children in the bathtub?
There is nothing sexual about it, nobody was harmed by it, but you can still go to jail and have the rest of your life ruined if a prosecutor gets a woody while looking at it.
It's art for the sophisticated connoisseur with voyeuristic proclivities into immature lives.
Eva Marie said...Children run around their home naked. Taking photos of them when they are not old enough to give consent and showing them off is exploitation of the trust that every child extends to every adult
No child would ever think that way unless they were taught to.
The childhood photographs are not publicly exhibited or shared. They are, for all intents and purposes, kept in the closet, along with other memorabilia. Maybe Automated Intelligence (AI) can generate a form with swirly lines suitable for publishing.
Find and replace: "her" with "his" and "Sally Mann" with "Jeffrey Epstein." We'll know the Epstein story is winding down when his wet plate collodions of black dudes have been released to the public.
"A photograph is two things, Roland Barthes said: what it says to the world and what it says to you. "
And if you are a pedophile, what does it say to you?
It's not about children being naked. It's about who gets to see them naked.
I think the magesterial newspapers would say her works are suggestive. Unless of course the political context says otherwise.
On the other hand, if it was common to see naked children, would that help to eliminate the sickness of pedophilia?
Men don't get excited about bare ankles anymore, but we see plenty of other nudity, and that hasn't worn out the thrill of it.
I, for one, await the fearless and avant garde museum that displays Internet Rule 34 art depicting the prophet of Islam. Perhaps with Allah looking down from heaven, approving, or participating. Until then, this BS "Art of the Transgressive" is just applying lipstick to the local pigs and holding a beauty pageant. Show us some real courage, art world!
"None is more graphic than your average Christ child of the Italian Renaissance." A reusable defense for any occasion.
Hmm...her work sounds like hate speech. Dont we need to protect children?
The first time I ever went into a Barnes and Noble was the early 90s. Browsing around I came upon photographer Jock Sturges' book, The End Of Summer. Whoa.
“I, for one, await the in fearless and avant garde museum that displays Internet Rule 34 art depicting the prophet of Islam.“
That’s why this is such a joke. The only artists who have a moral right to bullshit about artistic freedom are those who display the Charlie Hebdo cartoon. Otherwise shut up and stop displaying photos of naked children.
“ The concern is that somebody may be getting his rocks off. Otherwise it's art. For example the Christ child art is except from that because getting rocks off doesn't seem possible.”
Speak for yourself. For some of us it’s another reason to look forward to Christmas.
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