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[↑] Source unknown – Title Unknown (201X); [↓] Source unknown – Title Unknown (201X)

As much as I’m utterly fascinated by depictions of ejaculation, I’m really super not into facials.

I’ve already written about this once before–and while it was from way back when I was a baby blogger: my opinion hasn’t really changed.

These two posts are not really an exception that proves the rule so much as a proof of concept that whether or not I dig facials, they can be depicted in at least a somewhat artful fashion.

In the top .gif there’s a focus on palate–namely, a monochromatic scale from a pale through peach skin-tone, to the shadowed masturbating hand to the burnt umber background. (I do worry here because it looks like the stud probably jizzed in the woman’s eye–and seriously getting semen in your eye is an awful experience.)

In the lower .gif, the staging from left to right, uses the natural motion of the eye’s tendency to instinctive scan left to right actually adds to the dynamism of the trajectory. I love that her hands are covering his and that she appears rapturously in the moment.

I also really love how if you look in the background you can see his hand open and pull back, as if he’s a magician conjuring a magic trick.

Mona Kuhn – Claire Obscure (2001)

I do not have an entirely positive opinion of Kuhn.

Viewing this image re-contextualizes my thoughts about her work a great deal, however.

The first major difference is clearly the question of monochrome verses polychrome.

This image predates the earliest image in my previous post on Kuhn by a year. There’s the same intense intimacy and the creative deployment of depth of field  marking the later work.

Conversely, it lacks the profound sense exemplified in the later work of being anchored to a particular place and time–this is after all just a nude woman, darkness and light.

I think I’m supposed to appreciate the increased complexity and variation of the later work. Though honestly, I skew in an entirely different direction.

To me: Kuhn’s later work demonstrates an innate and unnerving sense of the interplay between colors. But there’s an almost galling lack of consistency.  For example, consider the more painterly affect of this versus the were she a painter she’d be using cadmium pigments and then leaving the finished canvas in the sun for a couple months to give it that sort of summer, sun-kissed beach bleached effect that accentuates her insanely shallow depth of field and underscores the conceptual interpenetration of her process with her material (French naturalist communities).

I reminds me of the topic du jour when I was pursuing my MFA: the role of color in fine art photography. The purists will argue that the purpose of color in fine art photography is to demonstrate something about the nature of color and lens based visual representation. In fairness: that’s already been done to perfection–see William Eggleston.

Others maintain color is just another form. Yet, the objection I always had to this is suggesting that the same–and I’m hesitant to invoke such a word here but since I can’t think of a more operable one, I’m going ahead: rules govern monochromatic work as polychromatic work.

I’m not confident enough with the clarity of my thoughts on the subject to push forward with that line of analysis at present. But, what does occur to me is that given Kuhn’s conceptual underpinnings her interest in the optics of intimacy and using naturalist communities as a sort of ersatz synecdoche, I feel the color–although contemplatively orchestrated–actually works against the stated aims of the work. With the exception of the aforementioned more painterly image, I feel like most of Kuhn’s work would actually function better with the ‘abstraction’ offered by black and white.

Source: vivipiuomeno1

Polly Borland – Gwendoline Christie from Bunny (2008)

It’s been decades since high school yearbook, but as I recall an image printed like this is said to ‘span the gutter’.

Like anything with a fine line between doing it well and making a hash of everything, there’s an art to it.

When something spans the gutter well–as this does–and is subsequently re-documented, there’s always–at least to my sense of things–an intense physicality that the image takes on.

I mean this is a tasteful, well executed image. However, presented as it is here it shifts, becomes in its tangibility, almost illicitly salacious–and that intense ambiguity serves the image well.

Source: veryspecialporn

Dmytro Gurnicki – Untitled (2016)

Strictly speaking, this frame is underexposed–the darkest shadow area should retain the vaguest insinuation of textured detail; and, as can be seen, along the lower right hand edge, there is zero shadow detail to distinguish from the frame edge.

In this case it’s not the end of the world, it’s easy to make out enough of the frame edge so as to interpolate and recreate the frame edge when making a print. (Note: that this isn’t the case with the left frame edge, which is actually very nearly perfectly rendered given the dim overall illumination.)

And while the rest of the frame is objectively underexposed, the effect is extremely flattering. (Ilford Delta Pro, at least in my mind, produces optimum results when you under- or over-expose it a smidgen.)

This is a strong image. But the main reason I posted it was because it exemplifies almost exactly what I was picturing in my mind when I was addressing the shortcomings of this Karel Temny image a couple of months back.

Source: gurnicki

#1000

An almost vulgar level of privilege allows this blog to exist. Without even really getting into the specifics, the fact that I have a working computer and have roughly 25 hours a week to dedicate to the undertaking is not something to which I am oblivious.

As such, I make a point of dedicating every 50th post to the broader real world context among which the usual content of this blog represent only an infinitesimal speck.

I’d planned to focus on the Stanford case where Brock Turner was found guilty on three charges related to sexual assault. Out of the up to 12 years in jail he faced, he will serve a total of three months.

Yes, his name will be added to the sex offender registry–something that his father famously referred to as an unfair punishment for ‘20 minutes of action’. Oh, and any MRAs or MRA supporters out there, you really ought to read the father’s statement in full. Rape culture is a feminist conspiracy, eh? Shut the fuck up, you’re argument is invalid–this letter exemplifies exactly what those screaming about rape culture have been saying for fucking decades.

Oh, you beg to differ. Check out Brock Turner’s statement where he refuses to take responsibility for any of his actions and instead blames drinking and the culture of promiscuity on campus.

But for all that: the statement given by Emily Doe–Turner’s victim–is one of the most incomparably brilliant, considered and deeply affecting pieces I’ve encountered in years. You really should read all of it. If you have sons, you should make them read it. (Also, if you want to know how to be a stand-up ally for victims of rape and domestic violence: be like Joe Biden.)

…

Early on June 12th, 2016, a homophobic bigot piece of shit opened fire into the crowd present at Latin Night at Pulse, a gay nightclub in Orlando Florida.

The Killer (I refuse to use his name because I think the attention fuels a level of narcissism which assists in motivating attacks like this) had two weapons an AR-15 assault rifle and a handgun. Both purchased legally despite having been investigated twice before by the FBI for suspicion of links to terrorism.

He managed to murder 49 vibrant, amazing people before the police–after hearing him claim to have bombs–stormed the club and put the fucker down.

The response was swift. Starting with the Lt. Gov. of Texas tweeting Galatians 6:7– Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.

The tweet was quickly deleted and an explanation offered that it had been queued to auto-publish ahead of the attacks.

Another info graphic perpetuated by a country music singer blamed the problem not on guns but on the fact that America is a godless country. It was especially idiotic given that a 2011 Census of England and Wales noted that 59% of the population identified as Xtian and in a 2014 U.S. Census 70% of American’s claimed to be Xtians. (Compare mass shootings in the UK vs the US and then you’ll recognized the preposterous nature of the assertion.) But then the examples this fuckwit used when considered in context, actually proved that guns are the problem.

Then it was reported that the killer called a news outlet to proclaim his allegiance to Daesh. (We must stop calling them ISIS/ISIL as by calling them such we implicitly lend credence to their despicable ideology.)

I’ve spent the week listening to and comforting LGBTQAI friends.

The thing you won’t understand unless you are LGBTQAI is the extent to which the queer community takes on the role of an extended family–in many cases serving as the only real family you’ve ever had. That’s part of what is so terrifying about this attack: it was located in what would normally be considered a safe space–a gay club.

Republicans trotted out their usual bullshit ‘thoughts and prayers’ rhetoric. We don’t give a good goddamn about your thoughts and if those are the same prayers with which you are trying to pray away our gay, then you have to realize how colossally fucked that is, right? Those people in a position to effect real, lasting positive change are too cowardly to stand up to the terrorism of the NRA.

And as soon as queer folks start talking about the homophobic underpinnings of the attack and the need for comprehensive, effective gun control, we’re accused of politicizing a tragedy. Well, double fuck you, our bodies and beings are already politically charged–you’ve ensured that. So you don’t get to make it political when it benefits your agenda and then retract the politicization when it doesn’t suit your needs.

I’m tired of hearing about ‘radical Islam’. Note: that the larger Muslim community was very quick to castigate the teensy minority within their midst who hold onto such abhorrent ideas. But, I have to ask, after decades of spreading homophobic hatred, where’s the religious right’s repudiation of those in their midst who continue to stoke this same cycle? They are notoriously silent. They’ll note the tragedy but then they erase that it happened to gay people.

It was refreshing to see an attorney for the ACLU call out exactly this demographic in a tweet. I realize that to combat bigotry with bigotry is a grevious mistake but at the same time I wonder how Xtians would appreciate being considered potential terrorists until proven otherwise. (Realistically, they represent the biggest threat to Americans right now. After all, just like Daesh the view the majority of America as godless heathens–the only difference is in the case of the former the group is operating from a station of fundamental disempowerment, while Evangelical Xtians have convinced themselves that they are somehow victims despite the present system being built, administered by and for them and those like them.)

Lastly, two points on gun control. Whenever this shit happens we hear the left calling for gun control and the right fired up because Obama is going to confiscate their weapons. Here’s the thing, a week to the day before the Orlando shooting, Obama answered this exact question. His response is so incredibly important to wrap your head around: essentially congress forbids the CDC from investigating the cost of gun violence. If you wonder why, you really should read this account of the R&D that led to the manufacture of the AR-15 the weapon of choice in Sandy Hook, Aurora, CO, San Bernardino and Orlando. Ask yourself what a wound from an AR-15 on an elementary school age student looks like? That’s why.

Two things in closing: @jacsfishburne penned one of the most amazing things I’ve read in the fallout from the events in Orlando. She says with simple elegance everything I want to say but can’t find the words.

Also, if you don’t believe that one person can make a difference, here’s devastating evidence to the contrary.