If I were Clement Greenberg...

In order to look and view this painting more critically, we must ignore the pictorial illusion, the subject matter and the narrative. Though this painting show cases some beautiful pigment, especially the broad ranges of neutral colors, with blue highlighting the skin and the background to tie the composition together, the figures are too dimensional. There is no flatness in the painting, and there is too much atmospheric light. The only segment of the painting I enjoy is the plain background and the runnyness of the paint at the bottom of the piece, where there is no real depiction of anything realistic. Overall, this is a pretty terrible piece.

5 More Images!

 Debi Oulu

“Hold on Tight”

  2011

http://debioulu.com/?page_id=8

 “A human climbing wall in which the holds are made of sexual parts of male and female bodies – penis, vagina, ass, breasts and mouth (all but the breasts being orifices). How does the climber feel having to jam his/her toes and fingers into these orifices in order to get to the top?” This is what Oulu says about this work. I think it is both bizarre and grotesque, and very compliant with my theme. I am awed at how her creativity pushed her to combine such a plutonic, every day activity such as rock climbing with overt sexual objects. 

 CJ Jilek

“Tart”

2010

http://cjjilekartist.wordpress.com/

 Some of her pieces are singular objects that stand alone, but I am more drawn to her pieces where there are two different object interacting, like the image I have shown. Her work fits with my theme because it is all about creating metaphors from the natural world, specifically how plants reproduce, and linking that to human sexuality. My theme of the grotesque and the sexual plays a role because the pieces she creates are unrecognized in the sense they do not look like plants. To me, they look like bizarre, abstracted interpretations of body parts. They are seductively slimy and sensuously polished and smooth.

 Patrick Veillet

“2010”

http://www.body-pixel.com/2010/11/01/patrick-veillet-bony-resistless-sculptures-gallery/

 Veillet’s two pieces I chose are very anatomical, antler like, and vertebrae like which are appear animalistic and almost gross. Because they are placed directly on bare skin, his wearable sculptures become sensual. Furthermore, the way he has photographed these pieces on the body, he has left one breast is exposed, which further accentuates its sexual nature.

 Jim Duvall

“Newtons Cradle”

2011

http://www.jimduvall.com/

Duvall’s photography is overtly erotic, but this image in particular transforms eroticism into a grotesque objectification of the female body. The way he treats the female forms by hanging them up, upside down, with their sexual organs staring at us straight in the face is hard to look at, as it is. This arrangement also reminds me very much of the way meat are hung up, strung together and side by side.

 Georg Herold

2011

http://artnews.org/sadiecoles/?exi=30054&Georg_Herold

His works are grotesque in their very angular abstractions with overly sexed stretching positions and the way he handles the material and modeling of the figure. His work is different than a lot of the others I have addressed in relation to this theme. I like the not as obvious connection between the gross and the sexual.

Five Images Relating to Theme

KIM JOON

Two Pieces Side by Side:

“Stay Snow White”, “Stay- Gone With Wind”

2007

http://www.kimjoon.co.kr/

Joon uses images of nude bodies in visually enticing ways with pieces and parts of the body that look bizarre and gross. The interaction between multiple bodies and their parts, especially because they are always naked, elicits a sense of sexuality.

SRI WHIPPLE

“Self Portrait as the thinker”

2009

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/entertainment/50982338-81/whipple-images-art-sri.html.csp

Whipple uses abstract forms that are gross in appearance and still heavy in their correlation to sexual reproductive organs to create intriguing pop art-esque paintings.

MONICA COOK

“Succi”

2009

http://www.marciawoodgallery.com/artist/cook/intro.html

Monica Cook brings together the world of food and the world of female contact and sexuality. Her paintings are both macabre and erotic.  

CRYSTAL BARBRE

“Hippopotamus Amphibius”

(Do not know exact year, but created after 2008)

http://crystalbarbre.wordpress.com/

Babre creates very explicit sexual imagery in her paintings and juxtaposes animal heads on the human’s body to unite wild animals with human sexuality. The audience is often taken back by her vulgar imagery. The animal’s heads come across as bizarre and perverted. I am interested in the links she makes in her work. 

MARCOS CHIN

"Machoman"

2011

http://www.marcoschin.com/fineart_01.html

Marcos Chin explores gender roles and the sexual roles of males. In this sculpture he beautifies male orgasm. This action would otherwise be seen as absurd or disgusting, but in this sculpture he makes it playful and childish almost, so the true action that is taking place is almost hidden.

Initial Artist Research (Make up for class Feb 7)

 Monica Cook graduated from SCAD in 1996 with a BA in painting. She is also trained in art therapy and has been a special education substitute teacher. She started a mural business about ten years ago, and that and shows and selling her work makes up her income.  She now lives and works in New York.

She is primarily a painter, but also does photography, drawings and animation. The work though, that connects to my theme are some of her paintings.  The painting below particularly embodies my theme of the relations between the grotesque and the sexual. Denoted in this painting are many women’s legs, feet, hands and bottoms, accompanied by one breast, octopus tentacles, and messy, slimy food. The women look like they are tangled together, but their clenching hands and bare bodies elude to a sexual nature. Cook captures the sheen and texture of the women’s skin covered with food, as well as depicts their body parts very realistically. I classify this painting as both grotesque and beautiful. The women are in erotic positions covered in food, which makes their bodies slippery and sexual.  A quote from a review oh her work is as follows: “Cook’s nude women engage with gorgeously rendered erotic food in scenes that elicit a range of emotion in the viewer from mesmerized hilarity to horror…”

            I think Monica Cook very successfully converges beautiful bodies with macabre slimy food and tentacles in. Seeing her work, I am inspired to explore what other substances I can use or depict in my work that can go from being completely every day life objects, to overtly erotic.

Connotations and Denotations

 

http://crystalbarbre.wordpress.com/

This is an oil painting by the artist Crystal Barbre, and is part of the Magnetisme Animal Series. Throughout the series she creates provocative imagery using the female body primarily, both by itself and in conjunction with the male body in the midst of sexual acts. In all of the pieces of this series, the head of the female figure is that of an animal. In this particular painting, the denotation is a woman’s body with a head of a gazelle, in a very seductive pose with slightly crossed legs and pointed toes, in the act of lowering down her garters. The connotation I have when looking at the piece is a sense of power within the figure as well as a graceful approach to sexuality. The hands have a sense of delicacy, and even the color of the garter is soft and peaceful. At the same time, I believe that the artist replaces the woman’s head with that of a wild animal to bring a sense of power to the image. She is commenting about women’s ability to use their bodies in a powerful manner to seduce men.  I believe this is why she uses animal heads in her series; because women, just like men, have the ability and power to be animalistic with their sexuality.