November 19, 2019

"The person, I can totally abhor and loathe, but the work is the work... Once an artist creates something, it doesn’t belong to the artist anymore: It belongs to the world."

Said Vicente Todolí, who was the director of the Tate Modern when it put on a big Gauguin exhibition in 2010, quoted in "Is It Time Gauguin Got Canceled?/Museums are reassessing the legacy of an artist who had sex with teenage girls and called the Polynesian people he painted 'savages'" (NYT).
“I love his paintings, but I find him a little bit strange,” [said Kehinde Wiley, a male African-American painter]. “The ways we see black and brown bodies from the Pacific are shot through his sense of desire. But how do you change the narrative? How do you change the way of looking?”

To ensure that Gauguin’s artistic legacy is not besmirched by his “marriages” to underage girls, these relationships should be covered in exhibitions, said Line Clausen Pedersen, a Danish curator who has put on several Gauguin shows. With each exhibition, “another layer is peeled off the protection of history that he has somehow enjoyed,” she said. “Maybe the time is ripe to take off more layers than before.”

“What’s left to say about Gauguin,” she added, “is for us to bring out all the dirty stuff.”
Despite the headline, the article doesn't seem to have anyone arguing for the cancellation of Gauguin. There so much money invested in these artworks, and people love them and have been gazing at them for years. Maybe some day people won't want to look and these shows won't rake in money.

But notice the confusion between the images themselves and what the man did in his life.

If we look only at the painting — if Todolí is right that "the work is the work" — is there still a problem? If so, is it about race or sex? Wiley combines the 2: "lack and brown bodies... shot through his sense of desire." Is the painter of nudes not supposed to have sexual feelings? Is the painter of nudes supposed to stick to models of his own ethnicity? Are artists supposed to report on their own environment and not go off in search of the exotic? This connects to my critique of travel: Is there something wrong with wanting to be with people who are, to you, exotic?

The NYT also quotes Ashley Remer, "a New Zealand-based American curator who in 2009 founded girlmuseum.org, an online museum focused on the representation of young girls in history and culture":
“He was an arrogant, overrated, patronizing pedophile, to be very blunt,” she said. If his paintings were photographs, they would be “way more scandalous,” and “we wouldn’t have been accepting of the images,” she added. Ms. Remer questioned the constant exhibitions of Gauguin and the Austrian artist Egon Schiele, who also depicted nude underage models, and the ways those shows were put together. “I’m not saying take down the works: I’m saying lay it all bare about the whole person,” she said.
Notice that even she isn't arguing for cancellation. No one does. But back to Todolí's "the work is the work" — and assuming Gauguin had sex with females who were "underage" in the sense that it would violate the law wherever 13 was not within the age of consent  — is there something wrong with a painting depicting a person that age in the nude? Nudity is a venerable tradition in art. That doesn't mean it can't be critiqued. I just want people who equate nudity with sex to be attentive to the leap they are making and to think about what they want to say.

100 comments:

Michael K said...

The Memory Hole.

rehajm said...

If you exclude all the assholes, the gallery will be filled with Bob Ross' happy little trees.

gspencer said...

"To ensure that Gauguin’s artistic legacy is not besmirched by his 'marriages' to underage girls, these relationships should be covered in exhibitions, said Line Clausen Pedersen, a Danish curator"

"We should also throw in something that Gauguin was a convert to Islam where child marriages, following the example of their prophet Mohammed, is considered a source of pride for Muslim men. And if anyone complains we can use the Islamophobia charge to shut down the debate."

Ken B said...

Isn’t this a colonialist question? What were the local, contemporary standards in Tahiti when Gaugin was there? Why should the standards of modern, uptight, upper class Western whites govern here?
Isn’t that exactly what this girlmuseum is all about? Her motto might as well be “Take up the white man's burden”.

tim maguire said...

I have no sympathy. Cancel away.

People who wanted to be remembered by future generations should have thought about future generations' value systems, shouldn't they have?

JAORE said...

Just got back from three weeks in Italy. A LOT of statues need covered, apparently.

Or at least a deep dive into the morals and intent of the artists that churned out all those little kiddies in marble. God forbid we determine the Romans and Greeks were not woke per the 2019 standards.

Grind them into road gravel for those shovel ready infrastructure jobs.

Right, ya blue-nosed scolds?

rehajm said...

I just want people who equate nudity with sex...

In the 1970s I believe The Met made a killing off the examination of the naked vs nekkid dichotomy.

tcrosse said...

Lust For Life (1956) was about Van Gogh, played by Kirk Douglas, and featuring Anthony Quinn as Gauguin. IIRC the portrayal of Gauguin is not flattering, although Quinn insisted that the spirit of Gauguin visited him on the set. He won an Oscar for the role, for which he credited the advice he got from the spirit of Gauguin.

tim maguire said...

Years ago, a friend of mine got mad that I had a Wagner CD because Hitler liked Wagner, and that meant Wagner was a NAZI, or as good as one, even though Wagner died long before Hitler was born. That was no excuse. He should have anticipated the Holocaust and the musical tastes of the people who made it happen.

Birkel said...

I'd like to know how Freeman Hunt feels about the slippery slope now.
Does "cancel culture" feel like it's waning?
Was stopping "cancel culture" before it got started a better idea than what has happened?
Who said this would happen in advance and predicted where we are now?

There is no option but to try to stop the totalitarian impulses before they gain purchase.

Freeman Hunt?

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

Is there something wrong with wanting to be with people who are, to you, exotic?

Read any thread at a place like Unz and you'll get grumpy old dudes bitching about American women and how they are going to go to Costa Rica or Vietnam where the women are lovely little compliant non feminists and it's going to be super awesome. White guys going off in search of LBFMs is as old as the hills. Whatevs. It's what they want to do with their money, and LBFMs want to receive their money, so as hardin would say, it's a transaction, and they deserve each other.

The more interesting question to me is, is there something wrong with wanting to be with people who are not exotic? Not wanting to travel? Not wanting to experience multiculturalism in your own daily life? Maybe wanting to live your life around people who share your culture? The answers to that are different depending on what your culture is.

bgates said...

I find him a little bit strange,” [said Kehinde Wiley, a male African-American painter who enjoys painting black women decapitating white women]

He was an arrogant, overrated, patronizing pedophile who, in a further parallel, didn't kill himself.

gilbar said...

Our Beloved Professor Altouse asked...
"underage" in the sense that it would violate the law wherever 13 was not within the age of consent — is there something wrong with a painting depicting a person that age in the nude

Try taking some PHOTOS of nude 13 year olds... Try posting them on your website...
You're a lawyer, you'll be able to explain it to the Police

Automatic_Wing said...

Neo-Puritan philistinism from a "New Zealand-based" American curator. How trite and unsurprising.

rhhardin said...

Child abuse was a personal moral failing until the 1960s, when it became a public problem.

Child sexual abuse likewise in the 1970s.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/1343837?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

It wasn't anywhere in public consciousness when I was a kid.

Wince said...

What were the practices in the places Gauguin was painting?

What was the age of consent? Did families offer daughters for dowery?

Was nudity routine?

Sebastian said...

Wait, I'm confused.

I thought prog liberty was all about one's own determination of the meaning of life and the universe. So who are we to judge?

And isn't child-love the cutting edge in the prog transvaluation of sexual values?

Or is the problem here simply white man/colored girls, whereas colored man/colored girls is morally indifferent, while colored man/white girls would be great anti-colonial payback?

James Graham said...

Here we Gauguin.

Sorry, but The New Yorker once published a humor piece which included that line.

rhhardin said...

I'd think that primitive people - in the medical sense of low life expectancy - would have a tradition of reproducing starting as young as possible.

tcrosse said...

Gauguin did not kill himself, either.

Big Mike said...

If we’re going to get bent out of shape over Gauguin’s art, then whatever shall we do with Mary Cassatt, whose paintings included mother’s with her young, nude or nearly nude, children?

mockturtle said...

Why is this sort of rubbish any different from the cultural purges of the Soviets? Going back in history to detect and ban anything that doesn't meet the modern standards of enlightenment? This cannot, and will not, end well.

mockturtle said...

At one time, many 'civilized' people referred to aboriginal folk as 'savages', in part because they had the good sense not to wear frock coats in hot, humid climates. So what? Do we know what they may have called us?

rhhardin said...

Armstrong and Getty, breaking news, bathroom break in the impeachment hearings. We have urination!

Ann Althouse said...

"White guys going off in search of LBFMs is as old as the hills. Whatevs. It's what they want to do with their money, and LBFMs want to receive their money, so as hardin would say, it's a transaction, and they deserve each other."

Even if I believed that crap, I would still say it's a separate question whether we should want to look at their travel pictures.

Infinite Monkeys said...

Gauguin thought the Polynesians were savages. He was French, didn't they think all non-French were savages? (It was a matter of degree, but still....)

gilbar said...

mockturtle said...
At one time, many 'civilized' people referred to aboriginal folk as 'savages', in part because they had the good sense not to wear frock coats in hot, humid climates


It's FAR WORSE than that! those savages didn't just not wear frock coats....
THEIR MEN WORE SHORTS!!!!

rhhardin said...

I worked Hiva Oa just the other day, where Gauguin was. TX7T

I don't know if the ladies still walk around topless. It was morse code, no pictures.

Daniel said...

bgates said...
I find him a little bit strange,” [said Kehinde Wiley, a male African-American painter who enjoys painting black women decapitating white women]

Actually, he doesn’t paint anything. He has a factory in China do the brushwork. He’s a fraud.

mockturtle said...

It's FAR WORSE than that! those savages didn't just not wear frock coats....
THEIR MEN WORE SHORTS!!!!


Gasp! Wow, they really WERE savages then...

Ann Althouse said...

"Try taking some PHOTOS of nude 13 year olds... Try posting them on your website... You're a lawyer, you'll be able to explain it to the Police."

For years, I've questioned the conflation of nudes and pornography. I know that the criminal law is very protective of young people who can be exploited (and that this law is severe to the point where teenagers sending their own selfies to a friend have been arrested). I can examine a topic in writing, on an intellectual level, without violating any law.

Our sensitivity about nudity — 50 years after Woodstock and "Hair" — is a fascinating subject. Museums have had nudes on display for a long long time — sculpture and paintings that are considered the highest sort of art, as if the body is elevated and made sublime by the removal of clothing and drapery.

SDaly said...

Is Margaret Mead up next on the chopping block.

I know that Samoa is not Tahiti, but Wikipedia describes Mead's work as reporting that "[T]he concept of age for the Samoans is not the same as in the West. Samoans do not keep track of birth days, and they judge maturity not on actual number of years alive, but rather on the outward physical changes in the child.... The first description of Samoan sexuality, [Mead says] that in addition to work for adolescent girls: 'All of her [additional] interest is expended on clandestine sex adventures.'"

Fernandinande said...

Museums are reassessing the legacy of an artist who had sex with teenage girls and called the Polynesian people he painted 'savages'

Savages vs Puritans.

rhhardin said...

As an empirical matter, if nudity is common then it won't be sexual. What such a culture has to do to make a situation sexual ought to be a good essay question.

SDaly said...

I think that even the late 20th Century view on nudity is bizarre.

When researching a question about the YMCA, I stumbled upon various stories (backed up by photos) that up until the 70's it was not at all unusual for men/boys to swim in the nude in public (even in public school), and there are pictures from the first half of the 20th Century of co-ed swim teams with the women in one-piece suits and the men completely naked. How did all of that get forgotten so quickly?

Michael K said...

People who wanted to be remembered by future generations should have thought about future generations' value systems, shouldn't they have?

No one is his/her right mind could have anticipated the 21st century's value system. At least those of children at elite colleges who have electronic megaphones.

Scott M said...

Orson Scott Card and Dan Simmons were unavailable for comment?

PM said...

If only progressives would spend all their time in a worry-fidget about the artists, writers, choreographers and composers they've adored - and leave current events alone.

Michael K said...

Margaret Mead was the butt of Samoan jokes. They lied to her and thought it was hilarious.

rhhardin said...

Museums have had nudes on display for a long long time — sculpture and paintings that are considered the highest sort of art, as if the body is elevated and made sublime by the removal of clothing and drapery.

Labia are avoided nevertheless.

Ken B said...

“Our” sensitivity about nudity? Which values of “our” apply in this story?

SGT Ted said...

What's up with the lack of multicultural understanding by these prudes? Is it because a white westerner was involved?

I bet these same folks are cool with Drag Queen Story Time where kids are sexually groomed by predators and their enablers.

Oh and Roman Polanski.


Kevin said...

"How do you change the narrative? How do you change the way of looking?"

Questions so stupid only an academic could think to ask them.

rhhardin said...

Under the half your age plus seven rule a 4 year old boy could have sex with a 9 year old girl.

Questioning whether first order polynomials are adequate.

effinayright said...

Try taking some PHOTOS of nude 13 year olds... Try posting them on your website...
You're a lawyer, you'll be able to explain it to the Police
**************

Malum prohibitum versus malum in se.

As old as the Bible.

Of course, "child brides" were common then, due to low life expectancies.

SGT Ted said...

"Under the half your age plus seven rule..."

I've always wondered where that came from.

The Crack Emcee said...

"Once an artist creates something, it doesn’t belong to the artist anymore: It belongs to the world."

Do these songs just belong to Three Dog Night and Gordan Lightfoot anymore? Or, after surrounding my lifetime, are they now fragments of American culture to be commented on?

I'd say this guy has a point.

bagoh20 said...

" I can examine a topic in writing, on an intellectual level, without violating any law."

So far, you can, but there are places you cannot do that, parochial, backward, totalitarian places like... Canada.

Robert Cook said...

Jerry Lee Lewis legally married his 13 year old third cousin. In America. In the 1950s.

Gauguin may well have been a detestable human being and his relationships with the island girls may have been unsavory in their particulars. I don't know enough about the details of his life to have an opinion. However, aside from the fact that we must judge art only on its own merits and not on the character of the artist, it is a bit much to smear Gauguin with slurs of "pedophilia" when, in our own country, in living memory, relationships between grown males and adolescent females was considered acceptable and was legal.

rcocean said...

"The ways we see black and brown bodies from the Pacific are shot through his sense of desire. But how do you change the narrative?"

The bodies seemed to be all Brown, as far as I can tell. But I'm not a "black body" so maybe I missed it with my "White Eyes".

The Minnow Wrangler said...

Meh. Lots of artists painted underage girls although most of them were clothed. There is nothing wrong with nude bodies. You can see plenty of naked infants and toddlers in ancient religious paintings.

The human body is a beautiful object no matter the age of the subject, and worthy of being depicted in art.

rcocean said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
rcocean said...

Do "Black Bodies" understand how stupid they sound, when they talk about "Bodies"?

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

Even if I believed that crap, I would still say it's a separate question whether we should want to look at their travel pictures.

It's not crap. You just don't see it because you are not exposed to it.

rcocean said...

If you're going to a Gauguin art exhibit just to see Naked Girls, you're doing it the wrong way.

Richard Dolan said...

Wonder what the Brits will do with the Elgin marbles when some snowflake figures out that Phidias had a thing for boys.

rcocean said...

Of course, Gauguin FORCED these "Brown bodies" to pose for him. Young Women NEVER want to be painted. That's why you'll never see a nude young white woman in Art. That's why Gauguin had to go the South Seas.

rcocean said...

Hilarious that the 20th century Bourgeois prudes who were horrified at Gauguin's "Pagan Art" and wanted it censored, might win in the end.

rcocean said...

I wonder if this scam is being financed by some rich collectors who want to pick up some Gauguin at fire-sell prices. Just hire some SJW experts to bad mouth him, drive down the price, and then pick them up for a song. Later, when the hoo-haa blows over, instant profit.

effinayright said...

Next artist to be canceled: Gustave Courbet for his "Origin of the World".

https://www.bing.com/th?id=OIP.bor8vpg30dYsE27IdKDHCQHaE8&w=251&h=165&c=7&o=5&dpr=1.5&pid=1.7


Obviously NSFW

gahrie said...

I just watched a YouTube video (by Bloomberg I believe) that spent twenty minutes talking about all the great things SpaceX is doing, and the last five attacking the company for not being woke, even though the president of the company is a woman. (Isn't SpaceX the only major aerospace company run by a woman?) I guess SpaceX needs to increase the size of its HR department by hiring a bunch of women.

gilbar said...

rhhardin wrongly and foolishly said...
Under the half your age plus seven rule a 4 year old boy could have sex with a 9 year old girl


I'm going to go slow here, so that you might be able to keep up

The youngest age that could be with a 9 year old is 9/2+7=11.5
The youngest age that could be with a 11.5 year old is 11.5/2+7=12.75
the youngest age that could be with a 12.75 year old is 12.75+7=13.375
...
half of 14 is 7
7 plus 7 is 14
so, the youngest a person could be, for it not to be creepy for them to be with a 14 year old, is 14.
(it's just as creepy for a 20 year old to be with a 40 year old as it is for a 40 year old to be with a 20 year old)
For ANY age less than 14, it's CREEPY.... That's the RULE
As Barbie said... Math is Hard!

ps. I don't really expect you to understand this, because you don't understand math

gahrie said...

If you exclude all the assholes, the gallery will be filled with Bob Ross' happy little trees.


You say that like it's a bad thing....

Anonymous said...

"...is there still a problem? If so, is it about race or sex? Wiley combines the 2: "lack and brown bodies... shot through his sense of desire." Is the painter of nudes not supposed to have sexual feelings? Is the painter of nudes supposed to stick to models of his own ethnicity? Are artists supposed to report on their own environment and not go off in search of the exotic?

The purpose of that "black and brown bodies" stuff is to "have a conversation", that is, shut down conversation. The wielders of such wouldn't be capable of engaging with you in any "interrogation" of their statements, even if they wanted to. (They don't.) These are apparatchiks, not thinkers, and "interrogation" is strictly a one-way street, consisting of using mojo words against all that stuff out there with bad juju.

Engaging with questions like yours would lead to questions like Pants's @10:02 AM and a lot of other tabu areas of inquiry, which is not at all the purpose of the original exercise.

Amadeus 48 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Amadeus 48 said...

Whole lotta harrumphin' goin' on in the Art World.

Birkel said...

CANCEL ALL THE THINGS

This message brought to you by Leftist Collectivists who want to control you in all the particulars.
All the power.

Supported by Freeman Hunt.

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

"White guys going off in search of LBFMs is as old as the hills."

Meanwhile, feminists win the Darwin Award as sure as Billy Ray held Zeke's beer when he lit that bottle rocket in Barney Akens' Tobacco and Firewater store.

Kay said...

I can totally and agree with the argument that this exotization in the work is dehumanizing. But I still wouldn’t cancel Gauguin. They’re very good paintings.

Michael said...

Wait till they get a load of Jock Sturges!

Can'tFindADecentAlias said...

David Hamilton. So many artists exhibiting WrongThink.

tcrosse said...

It is always fashionable to Épater la bourgeoisie but never to Épater les bien-pensants.

Ken B said...

Gilbar invents a whole new category of Hardin vindication.

daskol said...

Modigliani's nudes are all really sexual.

Robert Cook said...

"Wait till they get a load of Jock Sturges!"

I was thinking about him, but I couldn't recall his last name. There's also Sally Mann.

Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...

please, pedophiles, be Rich, Royal, and/or Renowned

The Crack Emcee said...

Tell Leni Riefenstahl to get a room.

buwaya said...

"Is there something wrong with wanting to be with people who are, to you, exotic?"
"White guys going off in search of LBFMs is as old as the hills."

"
'Er petticoat was yaller an' 'er little cap was green,
An' 'er name was Supi-yaw-lat -- jes' the same as Theebaw's Queen,
An' I seed her first a-smokin' of a whackin' white cheroot,
An' a-wastin' Christian kisses on an 'eathen idol's foot:
Bloomin' idol made o'mud --
Wot they called the Great Gawd Budd --
Plucky lot she cared for idols when I kissed 'er where she stud!
On the road to Mandalay . . . "

Mandalay, Kipling

Oso Negro said...

@I have Misplaced My Pant - Yep! Some OWGs go off in search of non-feminist women elsewhere in the world. I am one of them. I find American women repellent sexually. I prefer younger women to those my own age. And guess what? It’s no one’s fucking business but my own! I don’t give a fuck if it is socially unacceptable in suburban America among “decent” people who would applaud my bravery if I came out as gay and married another old man. I prefer women almost anywhere to American women. It’s a finely tuned misogyny.

Jupiter said...

If I am 4 years old, half my age plus seven is nine.

Math is not hard, but arithmetic can be.

JAORE said...

Half my age plus seven is too damn young for me.

gilbar said...

Jupiter moronically said...
If I am 4 years old, half my age plus seven is nine.


It goes both ways, Moron!

Ken B said...

Wow, Gilbar after being gently corrected twice doubles down on being a fool. It's simple language gilbar. “Half your age plus seven”. Your refers to the person deciding. Hardin simply applied the rule to a 4 year old. Half of the imaginary four year old‘ sage is 2. Hardin was mocking the rule. You made a pronoun error, and then doubled down.
I bet you triple down now ...

n.n said...

Trans-social.

PM said...

Balthus' work has been shown at the great museums, if we're concerned about pedophilia. Or maybe it's a matter of depicting vs hands-on.

ccscientist said...

There is no artist pure enough to avoid cancelation, especially when criteria keep changing.

Birkel said...

The rule is about dating.
If it cannot work in both directions a date cannot happen by the rule.

gilbar has the advantage of being correct.

Ken B said...

Ohhh. So gilbar is correct if you apply a different rule. Like Trump should be impeached if getting elected is a high crime. Gotcha

Dave64 said...

The Narrative must be obeyed!

Maillard Reactionary said...

Robert Cook re Sally Mann: She became well-known at first for her photographs of her own children, often unclothed.

Eventually they let her know that they didn't want to be photographed any more.

Later, she did a book involving photographs of decomposing human corpses ("What Remains"). Presumably, they never complained.

I think a lot of Sally Mann's creativity, sensitivity, and dedication, though her work is really not to my taste.

William said...

Does anyone know of anyone who looks at Gauguin's paintings for their prurient interest? If Playboy can't make a go of it, how much luck will any of these artists have? The male gaze has moved on.... I like the concept of abandoning your wife and job and moving to the South Seas to fool around with inappropriate women, but looking at Gauguin's paintings does not provide sufficient motivation......The other day we were saying that reading Shakespeare doesn't make you a better or worse person. Ditto with looking at Gauguin's paintings.....I vaguely remember reading that, before he abandoned her, Gauguin used to occasionally slap his wife around. Why do the curators feel that sleeping with under-aged Tahitians is more reprehensible than physically abusing and then abandoning your wife? These curators show scarce moral sense, and there should be explanatory notes about their moral deficits in the intro to their exhibitions. Perhaps it would be better if they just lost their jobs.

mockturtle said...

Art can be admired, artists seldom can. It's the nature of the beast.

Daniel Jackson said...

Come On. Not another round of "bad white guy in primitive lands supporting (er, exploiting) local ladies and their families with cash and prizes." The guy's art work across media is legion. Fifty five years ago, attending a DC art high school, Gauguin was Canon. I'd spend hours each week staring at his work in the National Gallery.

Yeah, he painted a lot of poor women (who could not afford clothing) of all ages and, I assume he paid them all for sitting. It is probably cheaper to pay modelling fees in the Islands than in Paris.

I have avoided, truth be told, portraying the nude form in my art work. Yeah, I had to do the obligatory "live model" courses and sessions ("as an artist, you need to study the nude form so you can accurately portray a figure clothed" bullshit), and, yes, the first few times were a bit stressful (much to the delight of my Mentors); but after a while it really is about light, shadow, and form.

But, this is not why I avoid scantily clothed models. Two reasons. First, as an older photographer, it is really NOT the reputation I want to do commission work. There are already too many dirty old men (and women) in the art field. This whole side of the Business creeps me out.

Second, after many years I have come to question the "seriousness" of the distinction between The Nude and Pornography. I keep asking me WHO BOUGHT THIS STUFF? WHY? Oh yes, the ideal human form (without a penis), variable tit sizes (depending on cultural and class preferences), and girth dimensions. I can no longer distinguish between Erotic Good and Erotic Not So Good.

Now, brush strokes, chromatic juxtaposition, light and shadow, and perspective (classic, modern, and maybe a Nude Descending A Staircase rendered Cubist)--I learn a lot from those techniques.

But, worrying about a Frenchman in Paradise from "our" enlightened vantage point?

Birkel said...

No Ken B.
The rule is always the rule.
Your attempt to apply it half the time violates the rule itself.

#LOGIC

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

I hope Althouse rereads this thread and apologizes to me for mischaracterizing as “crap” my comment referencing the male desire to cast off his own community’s mating stock and find less onerous alternatives in exotic populations.

You can pretend it’s not a thing because the betas in Madison don’t do it, that you’re aware of, but you’re still pretending.

mockturtle said...

You're right, Pants. It is a thing. But I must also confess a taste for the exotic. ;-)

Robert Cook said...

"I have avoided, truth be told, portraying the nude form in my art work. Yeah, I had to do the obligatory 'live model' courses and sessions ('as an artist, you need to study the nude form so you can accurately portray a figure clothed' bullshit)...."

One draws the nude to learn to accurately portray a figure. Period. And it's not bullshit. I took life drawing classes for years and it becomes a sort of practicing of scales: once one has drawn the human form thousands of times in every aspect--prone, supine, seated, standing, in action poses, paired with other models, etc., the small and large forms of the figure, and how they function as a whole, become ingrained in one's subconscious. (We once had a model who had her new born baby with her; apparently, she had no babysitter. At one point, she placed her baby on the model stand at her feet and took a standing pose. After a time, the baby uttered a small cry, and the model's breasts immediately began to leak milk. She picked up her baby and began nursing as we continued drawing.)

To confirm the point, it does become easier to draw a clothed form once one has drawn the nude thousands of times.

I eventually came to look forward to models who posed clothed, as, after drawing the nude form thousands of times, it became more fun and interesting to draw the volumes and folds of the clothing on the models than to draw another bare form.

Anonymous said...

Ok boomer

DaChad said...

Why are people so obsessed with what people did 20, 50, 100, 200 years ago doesn't fit their current view of the world? Must we delete history? Is this not populist revisionist history and equally abhorrent to government imposing its' view on the populace? If you're triggered, don't go.

Nobody cares about your offense at everything.

I'm starting to think people should just lock themselves in their homes and put parental controls on their connected devices to filter everything that offends them out.

Skippy Tisdale said...

"If we’re going to get bent out of shape over Gauguin’s art, then whatever shall we do with Mary Cassatt, whose paintings included mother’s with her young, nude or nearly nude, children?"

Or the photography of David Hamilton, which is actually beautiful.