Tag: female nude

Katty Hoover – Untitled from Lake Como series (2014)

Places that hold meanings for people result in the construction of
unique ‘memory maps,’ yet many memories manifested in the landscape
leave little, if any, physical trace. A pile of water-worn cobbles on
the riverbank to mark the time and place when you first learnt to
swim–the autumn floods that year would have removed those. The tree bark
or bus shelter where we inscribed the initials of our first love–the
tree’s new growth will have erased most traces, and bus shelters are
repainted or replaced. A first pet buried in a garden, or offerings put
into the ground to commemorate a family member’s death–most are unlikely
to survive the rigours of time. […] At Malin Head in Donegal, thousands
of beach pebbles spell people’s names, signing themselves on to the
landscape through a physical act. In many cases, the names within soon
become illegible, the pebbles displaced by the feet of subsequent
visitors, or re-used for new acts of commemoration. The ways in which
people choose to mark space and commit events to memory suggests that
similar, small-scale practices in the past may also have been transient
or overwritten, with the vast majority not visible in the archaeological
record at all.

–Adrian M. Chadwick & Catriona D. Gibson, from “‘Do You Remember the First Time?’ A Place through Memory, Myth, and Place,” Memory, Myth and Long-term Landscape Inhabitation, ed. Adrian M. Chadwick & Catriona D. Gibson (Oxbow Books, 2016)

wonderlust photoworks in collaboration with @marissalynnla – [↑] Marissa Lynn (2017); [↓] Pellucid (2017)

As I’ve mentioned, I had two photo collabs while I was out in L.A. last month.

It’ll be another three weeks or so on the B&W–I use a specialty lab that I ADORE (but they are impossibly slow).

Anyway, so for now here’s the edit of the color stuff from the afternoon I spent with Marissa.

I was extremely nervous about the lack of light. (In an irony that wasn’t lost on me, it rained almost the entire time I was in L.A. while it was 60°F back in Brooklyn…)

But it just goes to show–trust your materials, measure twice, cut once and things have a way of sorting themselves on their own.

(I’ve clearly been thinking about Alexander Bergström & Akif Hakan Celebi more than I realized…)

Source unknown – Title unknown (200X)

This appears to be an earlier image from the same sequence as something I posted way back when Acetylene Eyes was just a baby blog. (The similarities run beyond both being taken in a truck cab: that’s the same boy and the pattern stitched into the upholstery is an exact match.)

But there’s other similarities, stylistic overlap. I noted in the early post before #skinnyframebullshit was a fully qualified thing, that the vertical orientation was counter-intuitive given the tableau.

The astute reader will pause here to inquire but aren’t you being disingenuous? You’ve said on a number of occasions that whether the eye scans left to right over the image or top to bottom can be a part of the logic governing the decision between landscape vs portrait orientations?

I have two responses.

  1. You have to distinguish between actual 3D space and how three dimensions are rendered in 2D representation.
  2. I noted that about the previous posted image as well: the top 20% of the above frame and the bottom 10% contributes nothing to the compositional logic. (It’s negative space that doubles down on information that would otherwise be conveyed to the viewer even if it was cropped out.)

Let me expand that first point a bit further: from the standpoint of visual grammar, the image is telling the viewer that it has something to say about elevation. But that isn’t supported by the image. One only sees, what a meter of elevation from the low point of the stitched seam in the lower right almost corner to the halfway up the open passenger side door? (Depth of field, i.e. front to back representation of 3D space in 2D vs top to bottom orientation for the purpose of emphasizing a sense of concern with the relationship of various elevations are not interchangeable.)

Also, whereas I commented that the previous image would benefit from slight shifts in the poses, I think that a horizontal oriented frame would add a narrative denotation to the reading of the image. (Something which is conceptually appropriate given that the question what constitutes narrative is so similar that it runs virtually parallel to questions of the mechanics of eroticism.)

If her right leg were braced against the door frame instead of bent as such, it would open the frame up more. From which point it would be logical to cheat her a little bit further towards the edge of the passenger side bench, reposition the camera with a bit more of a down-tilt so that you can see a bit of the grassy shoulder outside the car door and perhaps something of what he’s doing with his hands–his current position above is hell of awkward.

My point is it’s a reasonably good notion for a image that unfortunately muddies matters when it comes to thoughtful execution.

There are some technical considerations to belabor, too. Gun to my head, I’d say this was shot digitally and desaturated in post. Shutter speed is below 1/30 of a second. My gut says its 1/8th of second given the slight motion blur of her left leg.

I can’t really quibble with the overall exposure across the image. Yet if this is, in fact, digital, then you’d want that highlight contained just inside the upper limits of the histogram.

Then you’d have room to selectively dial things some detail back into the some of the heavily shadowed areas in the frame.

Source: letmedothis.com

Jorge Golgo Quintero – Nuda 1605A (2016)

It’s the height of irony to me that so-called ‘internet famous’ image makers are so at odds with so-called fine art photography aspirants.

The former tend to have models pose in such a way that they are standing either right next to a window or a window is implied just beyond the frame edge; the latter tending to favor a more studio-tinged set up, i.e. the subject standing in front of a seamless backdrop.

Although the resulting work might as well be as different as day from night, both are–in point of fact–motivated by a similar conceptual tact: de-emphasizing the relationship between the body and the space the body inhabits.

Now, I can’t really say I’m especially fond of studio work. (Truthfully, it’s all a bit ubiquitous and cloying to my eye.) And I can’t say that I’m over the moon about this image–I mean there are some pretty serious problems with it.

I do want to acknowledge that there is something unusually vital about this image. It’s playful in a way that most of this type of work just straight up isn’t. Yet, that playfulness that contributes a vibrant vitality, also points a little too handily towards what makes the image so fundamentally problematic.

The image is very male gaze-y. The coy pose bestows a dynamism to the work by contextualizing nudity in a fashion whereby being nude is rendered transgressive by the implied relationship between the model and the audience. (I’m naked and want you to see me, but shhh don’t tell anyone, it’s just for you–in other words, she’s enacting the same misogynist charade that makes gross ass cishet men harass women on the street.)

(There’s maybe an outside chance that Quintero might be familiar with Robert Mapplethorpe’s famous bullwhip self-portrait, but that’s likely giving more credit than is due given the totality of his work.)

The difficulty is that conceptually the image undercuts itself. Yes, the pose is dynamic. But it’s overt stylization actually works against it due to the fact that the artifice of the pose is brought into sharper focus due to the fact that the model is so close to the background and that the strobes are set up in such a fashion where the flash fill is so bright it’s casting it’s own shadow in addition to the shadow cast by the key illumination.

Such artifice only draws further attention to the hyper-stylization of the image, which in turn casts a pall on the dynamism of the pose when it’s considered in the broader swatch of art historical sexism.

Source: jgolgoq

Source unknown – Title unknown (201X)

I’m going to attempt to coin a hybrid word: demi-sequitur. (And yes, I realize I could just use medium sequitur but conjugation will always be the part of language learning with which I struggle–and since I’m not in the mood for some snarky classics major (E.D., all classics majors are snarky af), I’m just going to opt not to conjugate and instead invent a hybrid word.

Anyway, if you’ll excuse my coining a hybrid word, Imma get back to this image but first I need to indulge a bit of demi-sequitur exposition.

…

One of the struggles I have with writing is sorting through a constant barrage of information in my head.

It’s not without use to think of it a bit like this. You’re in a store, purchasing a toasted bagel with scallion cream cheese and tomato. The cashier plugs your order into the register and tells you that your total is: $3.87; behind her someone scurries to shove a bagel into one of those toaster ovens with a metal grill conveyor belt.

You open your wallet and realize you only have $3 ones and it’s NYC, so get bent trying to get them to let you charge anything under $5. You turn to your friend and are like, hey, can I borrow a dollar.

But instead of them extracting their wallet and handing you a one or four quarters, they reach into their pocket and pull out a handful of change and throw it directly into your face. It scatters on the counter, shelves containing chewing gum and candy bars.

There’s a long line of people behind you and, the cashier is impatiently waiting for you to pay but you’ve gotta pick all the change up at some point so while it would make more sense to look for zinc plated change as opposed to copper, you just have to get all of it. (Trying to count as you go.)

…

Every moment my senses are not impaired, deranged or otherwise altered feels like trying to count out change from a handful of coins that have been tossed at velocity directly into my face.

A practical example: I was with a friend in a grocery store. We’d gone in to purchase beer. I was carrying a 6 pack, she was carrying a 6 pack. We were standing in the express 12 items or less line. Being in NYC, it was a very small space. You had to be careful to not knock over the snaking lane dividers that keep everyone in an orderly line. The loudspeakers were blaring Maroon 5 or some other intolerable pop fodder. There are people everywhere. Standing, talking on phones, chatting with others. Elbows, glasses, ironic facial hair, colors, textures–all of it registering, demanding focused attention.

My friend started kicking me in the shin. I did my best to keep my voice level but she was offended by my tone. See to her, she felt bored and under stimulated, so she did that to help distract herself. Whereas the kick to my shins was the stimulus that broke the camel’s spine.

…

I flew out to Los Angeles on Feb. 15th.

I love the food and climate in L.A. I detest everything else about the place. But as someone trying to cultivate a patina of legitimacy w/r/t my fine art photographic aspirations, I end up out there a couple times every year.

Also, I have friends there. Two amazing models: Marissa Lynn & Kathleen Truffaut (who I was able to collaborate with), as well as a friend from my time as an undergraduate.

My college friend is having a really difficult time. An ex recently pulled some of the classic cishet male bullshit where he was like I dumped you and my life without isn’t working out how I planned so I’m gonna make you feel like shit to feel better about myself. Also, her beloved pet Boston terrier is having pretty serious health issues.

So the trip was a good bit heavier than I anticipated as far as emotional labor and needing to be responsible/supportive.

The point is when I headed up to Oakland on Feb. 21st, I came down with whatever the fuck upper respiratory BS is going around out there at the moment.

Now–to put forward a crucial piece of information I’ve been withholding–my friend Amandine lives out there. And really: while, yes, I did go to L.A. to see my college friend, eat some of the best food in the damn country and work with amazing models, I mostly went to spend time with Amandine.

I was running a 102 fever when I woke up on Feb. 22nd.

Add to that my office–which wasn’t supposed to contact me during this leg of the trip–blew up my phone because one of our senior analysts thought his personal laptop had been infected with ransomware.

It wasn’t an especially great space to occupy–being extremely ill, being insanely stressed, not to mention anxious about the will-they-or-won’t-they questions with regard to the mutual and insanely complicated feelings between Amandine and I.

…

Confession: I’m growing increasingly put off by–it’s probably fair to say–most of the porn that crosses my Tumblr dash. It’s not that the production value is lacking. (I actually have an upcoming post on how a certain subset of porn displays a fetishization of quality that is both consistent and remarkably aestheticized.

And, yeah full disclosure I’m not super into heteronormative porn. So that means 90% of the stuff crossing my dash isn’t ‘made’ for me.

But things like this just seem repetitive, mechanical and focused on orgasmic release. (I do like that he kisses her after she sucks on him post-orgasm–there is nothing in the world like kissing your partner(s) post coitally and tasting your orgasmic juices mixed with theirs.. the taste is freaking intoxicating.)

On the other hand I do have a backlog of threesome/group sex stuff that I love and have been struggling over how to feature in a contemplative fashion. For example: this gif of three studs masturbating in a triangular form, one who has already orgasmed while a second boy ejaculates with impressive force while the third watches both his friends; this vintage image of an FFM threesome outdoors; this von Trier-esque image that vextape reblogged a while back; a lot of FMM stuff (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6), FFM stuff (1, 2, 3). Want FFF? I can point you in the direction of one. MMM? Don’t mind if I do. FMMM, I even have one of those. All female orgy? Aren’t you glad you asked?

…

I feel like once you move beyond the strict binary interpretations of physical intimacy, things automatically become more sensual. I mean that’s my experience, yes. But also, from a strictly pragmatic perspective, it has to. I mean, yeah, if you’re, 22 and having mad group sex, it’s probably cool. You can get off again and again and again without much muss or fuss.

As you get older, your body changes–late 20s are amazing, late 30s–meh. I’m not to my late 40s yet, but yeah… I’m banging on that door and I do not like how things are sounding from behind it.

That means that you learn to become a little like someone who is going with friends to dim sum. You know not to fill up on just one item–you want to try a bit of everything. But you really like this dish and those dumplings, so you over eat a bit but you also get to try everything. It’s about the different tastes/flavors but also a bit of discipline allows you to walk away feeling fully satisfied.

…

So I’m in Oakland. I have a 102 and change fever. I feel like death. My stress and anxiety is through the roof. Everything feels like it’s falling apart and I’m supposed to hang out with Amandine for part of a day so that we can catch up and clear the air.

See Amandine is only the third person in my life who I’ve ever been like I have feelings for you and the person’s response has been anything other than no, run away. She basically said: I feel the same. It scares the crap out of me and I wanted to run away, I even tried, but I can’t; there is too much here that I want to explore. We just need to move slow. This is new for me. I know what I want but I need to figure out how to reconcile what I want with the life I’ve made for myself.

I somehow managed through sheer force of will to be more or less operating at 85% that day. I was still definitely under the weather but I managed it so that she hardly noticed.

We had a fancy breakfast. Talked about her art. How things are going with my suicidal ex. In the process of updating her, I realized for the first time that we’re not taking a break like she’s said–that even if she were willing to discuss all the shit that’s transpired between us that I’m fundamentally unconvinced that what we have is worth the hell it will require walking through for months to work things out. Amandine held my hand while I sat at the table and openly wept; she said, you’ll figure out how to be fine again. It’s going to take a while. Longer than you think. It’s going to be hard. But you won’t have to do it alone this time.

We went for a hike. Saw an egret and snapping turtles. Then had coffee at a snooty cafe in Oakland.

We got ready to part ways. I told her that she was one of the most amazing, kind and radically empathetic people I had ever known and that I was in love with her. She said, I know. I’m just hoping that you know you are all of those things just as much as I am. I said I know. She said: and I love you, too.

I walked her to her car. She hugged me. It was quick, perfunctory. Guarded.

I think she thought I was going to cling to her. And that’s not an inaccurate premonition. I wanted to. But I didn’t. And I think that surprised her. (I can occasionally be self-possessed enough not to shoot myself in the foot several times every day.)

She returned to me and wrapped her arms around me again. She pressed the curve of her midline body mass into mine. Pulling me toward her that were her arms positioned differently, would’ve knocked the wind out of me. I stroked the back of her Guatemalan sack dress, could feel that underneath she wasn’t wearing a bra, just a cotton shift. She held me tighter. I could feel her muscles straining over her bones. As if she was trying to fuse her soul with mine.

She let go and looked at me. Then turned and walked to her car. I said, wait a second. She turned and I made a show of kissing my finger tips and them touched them to her forehead. She giggled, hiding her smile behind her hands and angling her face downward. In that moment, I warned with all the constant influx of information I suffer under, why I couldn’t stop time and memorize every single one of those marvelous laugh lines that wrinkled up her young face like an old newspaper balled up for kindling, spared at the last minute, unfolded and pressed flat against a table top.

…

You honestly deserve a medal if you’ve read this far.

I said I’d get back to the image and I plan to. But I feel like now, I don’t need to explain it to you. I feel if you bothered with all this you’ll understand why when I look at this I can see past it’s short comings: the over exposure, the flatness of space, the fact that the genders presented don’t actually match Amandine or my own.

But it’s profoundly relate-able because I can’t think about it without thinking of how it felt to hold someone like that for the first time in my life.

Source: casanovaserstereise

Bettina Rheims – MC6 II from Morceaux choisis series (2001)

I’m not especially familiar with Rheims work but from what I’ve seen of it, she seems to meet her subjects halfway.

What I mean by that is not something I know how to easily indicate. It’s kind of like this: most photographers/image makers operate with a reliable fixation on appearance as factual representation. In other words: they trade in the ontology of I can see this and I can show you this, so this must be ‘real’.

There’s a lot made of Rheims and her use of color in concert with insanely high quality printing to “[make] the flesh appears living and [contribute] a disconcerting realism.”

I don’t disagree with that summation. It’s more that I think the way Rheims uses her erotics as a mode of unsettling the viewer serves to create work that trades less in establishing sacred cow archetypes and more to show people as they are instead of how they would like to be seen or represented.

And isn’t that just the central tenet of artfulness–the dialectic between hyper-stylization as a destination in and of itself vs that rare effortlessness that takes oodles of effort to accomplish but the accomplishing carefully erases any sign of over-the-top intentionality on the part of the creator.

For something as heavily contrived as the above image is: shot in a studio, with precise lighting orchestration, there is something compelling about the way it absolutely doesn’t read as pornography in spite of what it depicts.

(Full disclosure: the above is not the image I wanted to post most of all. I am especially fond of this one from the same series but I couldn’t find a HQ scan of it, unfortunately.)