Misunderstood

Many artists occasionally feel misunderstood and I am no exception. Just in the last few days, one of my models asked me to do fetish work and a friend asked provocative questions after I completed a couple photoshoot. I never have nor will I do any form of erotica. In fact, that is contradictory to what I aim to capture.  

The body of figurative work that I exhibited during the recent Art San Diego got a variety of reactions. Several men and women showed strong emotion. (If you were one of them, thank you!) Some made sexual remarks and, of course, some showed aversion. This led me to consider every viewer approaching the work with their own preferences and experiences. And this led me to wonder, what is it that influences our reaction to nude figurative art? Perhaps it is our preconceived ideas about the human body that influence our experience, perhaps our religious beliefs, our previous interactions with nudity, our social norms.

While pondering this, I decided to enroll in a course, “Philosophical Perspective Valuing Contemporary Art’, which includes redefining art, looking into emotions and judgments and also contemplating how to distinguish between pornography and art. The course (from Oxford Continuing Education led by Dr Amna Whiston which I highly recommend) now nears completion and has certainly shed light on some of my reflections but, of course, also raises more questions.

Although I’ve been a lifelong figurative artist, I’ve struggled with some of the controversial art, including Jeff Koons’ ‘Made in Heaven’ series as well as performance artist Andrea Fraser’s 2003 project ‘Untitled’ (a video of the artist having a sexual encounter with a client) challenging. Fraser succeeded in creating an uncomfortable space in which she reexamines the role of artist, collector and gallery. For that, I do admire her. But has she gone too far?  

I believe nude art can be as diverse as the artists who create it. We have artists like Robert Mapplethorpe whose very confrontational S&M photographs shock and raise questions regarding censorship. We have Jenny Saville’s luscious flesh paintings or Chris Ofili’s Virgin Mary with elephant dung for a nipple.  Rewind a century and we have Renoir, often referred to as the ‘sexist male artist’ who was indifferent to how women subjects are as individuals. We can go even further back to Michelangelo’s last judgment (whose’ ‘offending bits’ have been scraped away and painted over shortly after his death). Though each of these artists are connected by the common thread of nude art, they are all radically different in both approach and purpose.

Although I do admire the above-named artists for various reasons, I do not feel a strong kinship with them. In fact, I occasionally feel offended by being thrown into the ‘catch all’ phrase of ‘nude artist’. 

 Even after many years of being a figurative artist, I still feel unable to find the terminology to really capture my work sufficiently. I approach my work with the highest regard for the human form. I wish to honor it and for the viewer to look beyond sexuality. To move beyond layers of pretense into the core of vulnerability.  I wish for a space where the viewer can leave preconceived ideas behind and simply be. Even my multi-figure pieces aim to capture emotional closeness. A oneness with another being.


What I realized during the course is that although artists do carry responsibility for the work, it is in the end the audience that completes it.