Tag: male nude

X-Art – Young Love featuring Maryjane (2011)

If you want you can watch a lo-res upload of the full scene here.

You don’t need to, though. No, really: you don’t–whomever curated this .gif set pretty much grabbed all the best bits.

I’m posting it here for several reasons. While it’s certainly not as pretty as the Sex Art scene with Silvie Deluxe and Whitney Conroy (I’ll honestly never understand the Janusz Kaminski wall of super white light aesthetic… shit PISSES me off)–and glosses over any explanation of who these characters are and how they relate to each other when they aren’t fucking–this scene manages to be extremely graphic and heteronormative without making me feel super skived out.

I think it’s beyond dumb that he pulls the I’m going down on you so you’ll return the favor bullshit typical straight boy routine. And I appreciate any straight porn where the stud getting off doesn’t involve a facial. However, by the same token, it’s really awkward the way you don’t even know he’s jizzed until the tacked on post-coital cuddling. I mean the typical male gender role demands a certain stoicism, but damn boy–would it kill you to vocalize a little? It’s not as if her parents are in the next room.

Le sigh.

Patricija Stepanovic – Untitled from Skin series (2011)

As far as creativity goes, I feel as if there’s the person who is unflappably driven. Who sets out in one direction and plows ahead without looking back. The instinct motivating such single-mindedness doesn’t necessarily make someone a good image maker. But it does seem to improve the odds.

Stepanovic is decidedly not one of those single-minded obsessives. She’s more a chameleon–shifting styles and genres on a dime. (The only consistent facet of her work seems to be her favoring the milky texture that comes from soft-focus and underexposure.

I won’t go as far as to say I dislike her work–there’s only a handful of folks whose work I’ll openly call out as bad–but it’s largely uneven, obviously derivative (ex. Stepanovic | Arcila) and maybe even a little sad.

I say sad because the above image was one of her earlier efforts. It demonstrates an eye that although not strong has a certain precociousness for the tenuousness of an ephemeral moment. It’s also extremely creative. Usually blinds like these–besides being annoying–are employed towards a more film noir reminiscent end. This tosses the usual playbook and instead uses them as an innovative backdrop. (This same creativity manifests in much of the rest of the work, only more often than not it skews towards executing something that’s already been done and the result achieves strikingly less effect the the original.)

I’m not interested in self-conscious homage to artistic heroes. But I am interested in Stepanovic’s personal vision. The few times it slips through it outshines the rest of the work like the midday sun next to a candle. Thus, I know it’s in there somewhere. It’s just not all that present in the work. And that’s a crying shame.

Inside Flesh – bad dream ii (2014)

Credit where credit is due: although I’m not especially interested in visual depictions of fellatio, I am consistently captivated by Inside Flesh’s treatment of the motif. (Fig. 1 | Fig. 2)

My fascinating has always and unfortunately been tempered by the post-industrial-detritus aesthetic and the monotonous mechanically repetitive sex they tend to favor.

In that way a glitched .gif loop addresses half my problem with their method of exhibition. And, I’m pleased to see them pushing their leather/latex/balaclava fixation in more religio-mythical directions. (Here: I love the fuck you, True Detective insinuation, the way the light accentuates her skin and dramatically emphasizes the cavity between her sartorius and gracilus muscles–which in turn emphasizes she’s doing most if not all of the work.)

Source: insideflesh

Malerie Marder – Untitled (1998-2000)

She explores the psychosexual undertow in close relationships by photographing herself and friends and family in the nude, often in seedy settings such as pay-by-the-hour motels.

Matilda Battersby on Marder’s Carnal Knowledge exhibition

If you only consider her ethos, Marder is exactly the sort of image maker you’d be right to think might motivate me to quit my job, sell all my possessions and become a disciple.

And as much as I love half her work, there’s a prevailing theme of contrite ars gratia artis–as if transgression (or perversity, in the best sense of that word) needs to necessarily be couched in the framework of fine art if it is to be worthy of contemplation.

Marder tends to be less careful in considerations for propriety when it comes to including herself in her work. There is certainly a nobility to that tact, but it does a disservice to her work. Although it’s not a conversation that seems to be percolating, anywhere with her work, I get the feeling Marder has more in common with vextape than Philip-Lorca diCorcia. (There’s zero value judgment in that statement; merely a reflection of the sad fact that our culture has seen fit to lavish praise on a fixation with sexuality that takes a more pathological, apersonal approach while banishing more experiential, personal work preoccupied with graphic depictions of sexuality to the realm of pornography.)

I guess what I am really trying to point to is that with only a few exceptions, the works that move me–and the above is absolutely fucking exquisite–is the work where there’s a greater concern for presenting the underlying truth with brutal, unblinking honesty.

I sort of not-so-secretly wish Marder would set out to make pornography, at least once in her career because I am certain the results would be nothing short of revolutionary.

k.flight – [←] in the back of the bus (2008); [↑] we thank you for the spirits that dwell in us and all things (2008); [→] P1080259 (2011); [↓] good morning (2008)

I don’t know what to say.

I’m just… I mean… fuck me, whoever k.flight is, she has a perfectly, omnivorous eye. I didn’t know it was possible to be in love with images but, well, yeah… learn something new every day.

Not to sound like a twitter tween but this, this right here is fucking everything.

Absolutely perfect.

Go ahead and do whatever you want with what’s left of me. And also, if someone knows who k.flight is I would do anything, and I mean ANYTHING for the opportunity to collaborate with her at some future date.

Source: Flickr / ladyalpha

Mona Kuhn – [↖] Untitled from Evidence series (200X); [↗] George by the Door from Evidence series (2002); [←] Libellule from Evidence series (2006); [+] Untitled from Native series (200X); [→] Untitled from Venezia series (20XX); [↓] Jacintha from Evidence series (2006)

I cannot in good conscience endorse Kuhn’s work wholesale. I fucking love the photos above–this one is great, too; but, hearing her defend her work is rather off putting.

She’s big into nudes due to their ‘timelessness’ and the human body as a ‘residence’. She’s quick to point out that she’s also interested in totality and, as such, sexuality being an element of physical embodiment–which is problematic for it’s failure to include the experiences of folks with an asexual reality–it is clearly a facet of her work.

She’s walking the same high wire as another photographer with whom her work shares overlap (a focus on nudes, specifically within French naturalist communities), namely: Jock Sturges.

I find her work much less disingenuous and of a higher quality but it still vexes me that she dodges accusations of sexual overtones in her imagery because while I totally think Sturges is a perv who goes to great lengths to insist he’s not a perv–and to be clear here, I’m reclaiming ‘perv’ in a non-value judgement-y, re-appropriative, sex-positive way–Kuhn images function due to a sexual tension. (I’m referring specifically to Jacintha [above] but I think there’s a voyeuristic heavy-handedness motivating the concealing/revealing of nudity, i.e. her depth of field–which clever–is also a wee bit salacious in the way it invites squinting leers.)

What always ends up nudging me away from these concerns is how powerfully the photos communicate a palpable sense of intimacy. I’ve always maintained that narrativity and how we determine what is and is not narrative holds up a mirror to questions of the function of eroticism. Increasingly, I am beginning to think that it’s a trinity: narrative, intimacy, eroticism.

Igor Mukhin – img167 (2009)

I’ve been looking at a metric fuck ton of Mark Steinmetz’s photos lately. And the reason I mention him is because of the fact that although I adore his use of space, he compositions don’t adhere to any ideal with which I am familiar.

With Mukhin, I can always draw a diagram. For example in the above image the staging from left to right of the nude male (standing in a modified contrapposto stance), the woman (whose semi-striding pose wouldn’t be out of place in one of those infamous Soviet war memorials) and the towel/purse hanging from the sapling form a triad that is not only easy to scan but also suggests a downhill slope from right to left toward the stream.

There’s also the little details: the darkest points in the frame are the purse and her inseam. This pulls the eye back to the man’s carefully man-scaped, uncircumcised member. (I enjoy the contradiction in his more modest post and the way she seems to be standing to block him from view slightly even though clearly whatever led up to this scene didn’t involve any sort of concern for modesty).

In fact, that’s what I think I dig most about Mukhin’s work: even aside from the fact that he tends to release images in groups inclusive of a particular happening, removed from the grouping there’s still very much a feeling of the image as rooted firmly in a very particular milieu. The virtue of what is included is that it points strongly towards what was excluded.

(In a value-neutral judgment, Steinmetz’s photos are dislocated, free floating, timeless. Thus his tendency to name images with their location.)

And I’m not sure if it’s because the first thing I encountered of Mukhin’s was his more erotic imagery but to me the specter of permissive sexuality seems to always resonate with his work. Such as here, where I can’t help wondering if what I think might have led to the need to brush one’s teeth is why the woman is brushing her teeth.

This photograph verges on being narrative because I want to know the nature of the events that led up to this moment. And the thing that Mukhin is so talented at doing is presented as a story something that he as the image maker stands in the same position as the viewer with regards to curiosity as far as origination.

Source: Flickr / im_foto

Ren Hang – Untitled (2013)

It’s a depressing truth: Acetylene Eyes includes far, far too few of Hang’s images. In fact, I’ve only posted one previously–it’s worth revisiting as it’s a damn fine picture but also because I absolutely stand by my commentary.

The confrontational constancy of the work is less off-putting to me now. Yes, it’s trangressive as a hot goddamn. I’ve come to not only admire Hang’s Negative Fucks Given™ tact but to find humor in it.

The humor comes when you realize that he actively lampoons Internet famous photographers. His use of strobe is all Terry Richardson. The work in his second 2014 gallery takes brutal pot shots at the obvious disparity (and disingenuousness) between the public explanations and private intentions of folks like Noah Kalina and Ryan McGinley.

And what I’m realizing is his work also integrates color into not only composition but the image as a whole in ways that very few people since Eggleston have managed.

Source unknown – Title unknown (19XX)

I tried to draw attention to this series a few posts back but on the grounds of quality of craft, i.e. adept handling of a diverse tonal range and unimpeachable attention to skin tone/texture.

Yes, some of the framing is awkward but I feel that’s more than counter balanced by the fact that the camera remains at enough of a remove that it remains voyeur instead of becoming an ersatz participant in the liaison.

(And my Wittgensteinian side thrills in the fact that the action–haphazardly framed or not–is firmly grounded in the context of a background equal parts Ostra Studios and anticipating Saudek.

Source: robotromis221168

Source unknown – Title Unknown (198X)

I consider it a damn shame that I can’t trace exact attribution for this image. All I know is that it seems to have been a popular set shot in Russia circa the 1980s.

Its #skinnyframebullshit is so egregious it’s laughable. However, setting that point aside this and the rest of the images from the aforementioned set are disarmingly charming.

I love how he’s naked and she’s clothed. Her exposed labia are a little too dimly lit to comply with porn expectations–instead I read it as reading as the boy going down on her prior to the scene in the above image (which appears to be supported by the set).

I love how he’s stroking her hair and her visual preoccupation to the proceedings in the majority of photos from the set.

Taken together the set suggests a curiosity the mirrors the rapt, passionate explorations of the couples. Nothing about it feels staged, artificial or contrived.