December 19, 2015

The artist Sarah Sole calls her artistic take on Hillary Clinton "libidinal," distinguishing it from "all of the man-love for Obama" — such as Shepard Fairey's HOPE poster.

Rolling Stone explains.
People like Fairey "would project the most sublime, personable, personal aspirations [onto Obama]. He was pure, he was wonderful, and so of course they're going to be disappointed," Sole says. "I don't do that with Hillary. I like Hillary's impurities."...
Sole explains that the painting, "Red Gun," is a play on a photograph of Natalie Wood that ran in Life magazine in the Fifties. "The gun is the phallic power, it's sexual, but it's not eroticizing violence — it's eroticizing the idea of women with power, phallic power," she says.

To Sole, it's sexy. The sexiness of Hillary Clinton was what drew her in. "I just like her swagger. She's got something very butch about her that I like. Part of the delight of Hillary was that I was attracted to her, physically," she says. "And it was fun playing with that, even if I didn't paint well enough to make her into a beautiful woman."
You can see some of the paintings at the link and lots more of them here. You might like them, even if you're laughing at (or with) her "I didn't paint well enough to make her into a beautiful woman."

Here's what I think is the source material alongside "Red Gun":



I like this idea of taking a photograph of one person and redoing it with another person. There's commentary in the difference between the two.

What did the artist mean by "I didn't paint well enough to make her into a beautiful woman"?




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ADDED: I think Sole is trying to do something like what Drew Friedman has done so brilliantly. Look at "Warts and All" (and the other Friedman books you'll see at that link). He worked from photographs of celebrities and he sure didn't try to make them beautiful. He leaned into surreal ugliness. Friedman's work appeared in Spy Magazine from 1986 to 1992. When I thought about that I had an a-ha moment:

47 comments:

Paco Wové said...

"We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good."

Sebastian said...

"Part of the delight of Hillary was that I was attracted to her, physically."

?

campy said...

Looks like the last thing Vince Foster saw.

Curious George said...

I would name the painting "Vince Foster's last moments"

Ignorance is Bliss said...

What's with the picture of Tom Brady holding a gun?

Sharc said...

Tripe.

MadisonMan said...

I'll guess that Hillary!! did not commission the painting. If she did, I doubt she'll pay for it.

I think if I had the painting that it would grow on me -- it's not like I could like it less after my initial reaction :)

Quaestor said...

There ought to be camps for people like Sarah Sole.

F said...

Please pass the eye bleach

Noton Yalife said...

Supportive depictions of a government that takes power through violence against its citizens is why I own guns.

I can't wait until "Or Else" gets photoshopped under it.

dbp said...

I want to vote for #3 but I suspect the artist likes HRC, so #1 or #2 are more likely to be true.

SomeoneHasToSayIt said...


Stockholm syndrome is the only thing that would describe someone's emotional attachment to Hillary.

19th amendment. Worst. Amendment. Ever.

campy said...

Twisted minds think alike.

Jason said...

The woman on the SPY magazine cover looks more like Karla Homolka.

mtrobertslaw said...

"Red Gun"? Wrong title. Right title: "Hillary has a Man Problem."

Gahrie said...

The sexiness of Hillary Clinton was what drew her in.

Repeal the 19th Amendment

traditionalguy said...

Political power comes out of the barrel of a gun. I think Hillary said that. Or did she say power comes out of the Nuclear Warheads on an Iranian guided missiles called the Sword of Obama's Arab Spring.

eric said...

I'll never be able to un-see that picture.

Quaestor said...

Ask and ye shall receive...

Hillary's position on the Second Amendment.

Hillary defends her aging face.

Hillary offs a punk.

tim maguire said...

Hillary looks gangsta. Which seems appropriate.

Chuck said...

I see where this is going.

"You need to vote for Obama because of all the bad things your race has done to black people" worked so well, they turned it into, "You need to vote for Mrs. Clinton because of all the bad things men have done to women."

Roger Sweeny said...

I would title the series of paintings at the link, "Hillary is sexy and so and I." I actually think they kind of work.

David Begley said...

All of Sole's Hillary paintings are fab.

Saw Hillary in Omaha and that's exactly how she looks.

I hope the entire electorate sees ALL of these paintings.

William said...

You don't get the sense that she's aiming at ISIS.

Laslo Spatula said...

On the dark rain-slick streets of the dirty city, in the garbage-strewn alleys and the shady back-street businesses with the blinds pulled down, they had a name for her: The Lady in Red. Rumors passed in whispers, nervous glances over the shoulder: she could be there. She could be Anywhere.

Lady H did not mind these rumors. These rumors were better than the Gossip and Complaints, the little people with their petty thoughts and petty crimes -- it was Good for them to fear her.

Tough men had made these streets run red with blood, and who was to say a Dame could not do the same?

Lady H loved the feel of a gun in her hand: the power, the weight, the fact that a single pull of the finger could put an end to the whimpering cries on the person on their knees in front of her, on a cement floor in a basement beneath an abandoned building, down a street with no streetlights, overrun by rats and filth.

This sick and dying city abandons its buildings, and the World of the Swells had abandoned her, left her for dead.
They did not know that Lady H would not go down quietly. Lady H would not go down at all.

Coming back to her office, she closed the door behind her, the glass in the door frame rattling its loose fit. Yes, the office needed work, but there were other pieces of business that had to be attended to first, dirty business that so often ended in lead and blood.

"Is that you, Lady H?" her assistant Huma called from around the file cabinets. Those file cabinets: what they contained could bring this very city to ruin.

"It's me, my sweet," lady H said as she approached her raven-haired assistant. Huma wore dark red lipstick because that is what lady H liked: Huma did Everything that Lady H liked.

"I have a glass of Vodka on the desk for you."

Hillary picked up the chipped glass and made quick work of its contents.

"You know what I want you to do Huma."

"Oh Lady H, you know I hate this part..."

Lady H removed the gun from her purse, the gray metal still warm from finished business.

"Put the barrel between those red lips, Huma."

"Huma started to speak, realized it would be of no use, then simply did what she was asked.

"Suck on it, my sweet Huma. Suck hard."

Huma sucked on the barrel of the gun, her head moving back and forth, causing her long sweep of dark hair to cascade down to the cleavage contained in her tight pink sweater.

"That's right, Huma," Lady H said, patting Huma softly on the head before withdrawing the gun.

"This whole damned dirty town will one day suck on my gun, I swear it," as a look of fear crossed Huma's pale yet exotic complexion.
"
"You know I wouldn't hurt you, right Huma?"

"Yes, Lady H," Huma replied, a trace of uncertainty in her voice.

"Ah, Huma, but actually I would. If you ever let me down or double-crossed me I would shoot you as surely as I shoot those men in the basement."

"I -- I understand, Lady H."

"No one crosses Lady H", Lady H said, while Huma poured her another shot of vodka...

I am Laslo.

David Begley said...

Widespread distribution of these paintings might cost Hillary the election.

Please do YOUR part.

robother said...

The Last Thing Vince Foster Saw.

The Godfather said...

Even with a gun pointed at my head I wouldn't vote for Hillary!

Sean Gleeson said...

From the angle of the revolver and her head, I would say it looks a little more like this other Natalie Wood photo, from the same session.

holdfast said...

Hillary's surface is merely plain.

The horrific ugliness is on the inside.

Laslo Spatula said...

The blindfold removed, Bernie found himself on a metal folding chair in a dank cement basement, lit by one lone overhead bulb. Nerves as frazzled as his wispy white hair, he looked around vainly in hopes for help, but realized that this was the kind of basement where Hope never arrived.

Lady H pointed her gun at Bernie, and cackled softly.

"So you thought you could take me on?" she said, her voice a shrill whisper with the trace of vodka on her breath.

"I -- I should've known better. I know that now," Bernie answered, eyelids twitching like summer moths.

"Open your mouth, Bernie."

"But--"

"Open it!"

Spiritually beaten, Bernie opened his mouth, and lady H slid the gun barrel back and forth between his quivering lips.

"Suck on it, Bernie! Suck on my long hard steel!"

"Bernie did what he was told; he only hoped the end would be painless and quick. He had heard the stories, stories of Lady H slowly torturing her prey, toying with them, before the final release came with an onrush of lead.

"Bernie, I am not going to kill you," Lady H said, pulling the wet gun from his mouth.

"No?" Bernie whimpered, afraid to even believe in Hope.

"You are of more service to me alive. At least for now. You will be a walking exhibit of submission to me," she said, stroking his cheek with her liver-spotted hands.

"Anything you ask, Lady H. I will do anything."

"That's good, Bernie. Let's keep that attitude: bend over the chair and pull down your pants."

"What?" Bernie asked, not understanding -- yet.

"Bend over the chair and pull down your pants. You didn't think I was done with my Gun Fun, did you? Hillary laughed, her voice echoing along the basement walls.

"Bernie, you are my bitch now. And I'm going to treat you like bitches should be treated."

"Bernie nodded, then hung his head in resignation. He had seemed so close to Reaching the Top, and now he was here, in this dank basement with the one lone bulb, being sodomized by a gun held by The Lady in Red.

"Don't worry, Bernie: you'll live. But it WILL get worse before it gets better..."


I am Laslo.

walter said...

Damn it. I am suddenly in favor of trigger warnings. I'm going to have to watch a lot of porn to erase that imagery.

SukieTawdry said...

Oh, please. Janet Reno is sexier.

chillblaine said...

Hillary's head is too small in that image. Makes her look like she has pendulous grandma boobs.

Etienne said...

The paintings display little to no talent. They are void of any emotion, and look like communist propaganda posters during the long march. The posters left behind during the retreat, and used in the fire keeping the dog-chili warm.

I went to the store yesterday, and they had "chili" on the shelf. Chili is short for "Chili con carne" or "Chili with meat".

In looking at the label it said there was no meat in it. WTF??

It would have to be "Chili sin carne" without the meat, but that couldn't be shortened to "Chili", could it? Is this a little rape, or a big rape?

Maybe just a conundrum...

Quaestor said...

There something peculiar about that picture. I can't put my finger on it...

cubanbob said...

Deep down, Sarah Sole has a problem with her soul. The article is actually disturbing.

el polacko said...

so now a penis is a good thing...as long as it's on a woman.

Lucien said...

If only she'd had that gun when she was pinned down by sniper fire.

Ken Mitchell said...

In the Natalie Wood photo, she's standing there pointing a pistol WITH HER EYES CLOSED. How in the HELL does she expect to hit anything with her eyes closed?

Smilin' Jack said...

Here's what I think is the source material alongside "Red Gun":

Juxtaposing Hillary & Natalie goes far beyond cruel neutrality.

dustbunny said...

the painting looks more like Camille Paglia than Hillary

David said...

I think she found that Spy cover outfit in Bill's sock drawer. Then she took her very first selfie.

Etienne said...

Natalie had two pictures. One with her eyes open. That's the one. Not the eyes shut one.

Laura said...

Caitlyn Jenner, a woman with phallic power.

Mechanically speaking, the power in the sexual act resides in the pelvis, not the phallus, making the potential for each sex to drive the act . . .

Must. Steer. Back. To. Penis. Envy.

Do chromosomes count when electing the first woman president?

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

The artist was absolutely repulsed by Hillary's bloodlust, she said. I'm not seeing that revulsion revealed in her work.

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