The paintings below have been gathered onto this page due to their sexual imagery. Having said that, they really have less to do with sex than with politics, ageing and sexuality in general -- of anyone, wthin a long history of artists using explicit imagery to delve into sexual politics, (for example Manet, Picasso, Egon Schiele, David Wojnarowicz, and Lynda Benglis), not to mention the many contemporary artists borrowing on pornography or simple erotica (eg. Tom Wesselman, Jeff Koons, John Currin).
The works recontextualize youthful and idealized bodies into situations all of us share to varying degrees in our daily lives -- having to do with thoughts not only about sexual gratification, but how we feel about ourselves, and how sexuality of any kind figures into a Puritan society where religious taboos continually try to douse the subject with cold water (if not outlaw it completely).
Amid the explosion of online pornography these days, I'm interested in asking if or how you can de-porn pornography? The texts on some of these drawings come from pompous-sounding reviews and articles in current art magazines, raising issues (in my mind) about what "art" in its many guises, is trying to accomplish today. Does some of what we see in museums and galleries amount to little more than a type of sexual gratification for the artists (and the viewers)? More pointedly, does art that claims efficacy towards political and social goals or awareness amount to anything more than pornography? Hard to figure indeed.
Any depiction of sexual activity here has been based on online imagery and does not necessarily reflect a person's sexual identity. The models here whom I've hired to pose are, to my knowledge, heterosexual and happily so. But they live in and reflect changing times, and seem quite accepting about sexual identity either way, complicit not only in its depiction but also in our gaze.
JOHN CURRIN
LYNDA BENGLIS
FRANCIS PICABIA
DAVID SALLE
JEFF KOONS
