WouldntULike2Know 1/29

In class today we formulated discussion around our past three readings and tried to connect them in the best way possible. In discussing what is meant by what is left silent, defining what something is by what it is not, and the perverse or alternate way to read a text or image I began to recall on texts and images that I have had difficulty with in the past. This got me thinking.

Last year, I took the class Culture Wars with Dr's Levis, Libby and Musgrave. We read about and were shown a variety of culturally and morally challenging texts and images. The one that seems to stick with me is the work of an artist that is hard to forget. If you are familiar with Robert Mapplethorpe's work then you know what I am talking about. If not, I urge you to google him and I warn you to brace yourself. Mapplethorpe's artistry is photographs of primarily three things: flowers, nudes, and homoerotica. His flowers are lovely, his nudes are (sometimes) rather tasteful and occasionally of famous actors, and being gay himself, his homoerotic art is rather challenging for a more conservative viewer (case in point, his self-portrait of a bull whip inserted into his anus.) There has been, however, a large outcry on at least two of his works involving children (to the best of my knowledge.)

The first I was unfortunately unable to find a link for, entitled "Honey" shows a two year old girl sitting on a stoop and wearing a loose fitting dress. The camera angle is tilted upwards to reveal her genitalia. When he photographed this girl, what were his intentions? Mapplethorpe once said "I went into photography because it seemed like the perfect vehicle for commenting on the madness of today's existence." If thats the case in "Honey" what was he commenting on? In turn, was his "comment" only perpetuating the crudity of child pornography--to which could be considered "madness of today's existence." How else are we to think in perversion of this highly perverted text?

The second, entitled Jesse McBride, shows a young boy completely naked, sitting atop a chaise lounge. http://siteimages.guggenheim.org/gpc_work_midsize_934.jpg The vulnerability of these two children is completely evident and I, as well as many others I'm sure, struggle to find the meaning of this work. Why is it that his photographs of naked children, when displayed on a museum wall, are praised for their contrast, shadows and brilliant camera angles, while the sicko down the street gets arrested for his private collection of similar photos? Macherey would ask, what is not being said in this image. However, given the perverted nature of these works, I find it difficult to be able to think about them in a different way thereby inhibiting me from understanding what it is he really is saying.