Category Archives: visual culture

Icons of erotic art #13, 14 and 15

Grand bath at Bursa (1885) by Jean-Léon Gérôme

Grand bath at Bursa (1885) by Jean-Léon Gérôme

 

The Turkish Bath (1862) - Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres

The Turkish Bath (1862) – Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres

In the Tepidarium (1881) - Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema
In the Tepidarium (1881) by Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema

I quote from my text on Ingres’s Turkish Bath, but the validity is for all three paintings:

When Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, director of the French Académie de peinture painted a highly-colored vision of a turkish bath, he made his eroticized Orient publicly acceptable by his diffuse generalizing of the female forms, who might all have been of the same model. If his painting had simply been retitled “In a Paris Brothel,” it would have been far less acceptable. Sensuality was seen as acceptable in the exotic Orient.

Most of my renewed interest in these painting has been thinking about books such as the Pre-Victorian British erotic literature epistolary novel The Lustful Turk and reading Turkish author Bedri Baykam’s pamphletish but nonetheless thought provoking history of modern art Monkeys’ Right to Paint , which contends that modern art (he means modernist art) is largely influenced by non-Western arts. Baykam takes the 1984 MoMA exhibition Primitivism in 20th Century Art as a starting point for his rant against the art establishment.

See also

Previous entries in Icons of Erotic Art here, and in a Wiki format here.

Satisfied that the photograph has been censored

Thousand cuts

Death by a Thousand Cuts is certainly one of the most gruesome photographs in the history of visual culture. I first encountered the photo online and later when I purchased Georges Bataille’s The Tears of Eros (currently available from City Lights). The version above is from the Dutch booklet Kaarten (1967, published by Born N.V.) an excellent little study by Drs. P on his postcards with a full bibligraphy on contemporary books on collecting postcards which even mentions Ado Kyrou’s treaty of the subject, L’age d’or de la carte postale (1966) which I have in my collection.

What is particular of this postcard is its obvious censorship. And actually, for once I’m really satisfied that the photograph has been censored, because I would not like to show it to you in its original version. The notes to the postcard read “Ling-chi” or “One thousand cuts”, the barbarous death penalty for a parricide in China. Published by Karl Lewis, no. 102, Honmura Road, Yokohama, Japan.

Introducing Anton van Dalen

Anton van Dalen is a Dutch illustrator residing in the United States. He was during a period of 30 years the “secret” assistent to Saul Steinberg. His style is unique but reminds of Bracelli‘s work in the 17th century and its somewhat distanced pov feels a bit like Glen Baxter‘s absurd illustrations.

Here is a set of motor vehicle impressions via Bibliodyssey: [1] [2] [3] [4]

Bibliodyssey brought this set to my attention, if you are not already subscribing to his feed, you should. Since the demise of Il Giornale Nuovo, Bibliodyssey is the best hang-out for your daily dose of vintage visual culture.

For those of you unfamiliar with Bracelli’s work here is an example of his proto-surrealism:

From the Bizzarie di varie figure (1624) by Giovanni Battista Braccelli

From the Bizzarie di varie figure (1624) by Giovanni Battista Braccelli

Here is perhaps a better example, showcasing Bracelli cubism comparable to the one of van Dalen.

RIP Ettore Sottsass (1917 – 2007)

Unidentified photograph of Ettore Sottsass

Carlton Cabinet (1981) – Ettore Sottsass

Invitation to the first Memphis presentation, Sept 18 1981,

graphics by Luciano Paccagnella.
image sourced here

Ettore Sottsass Olivetti Valentine, first released on Valentine’s Day 1969.

Ettore Sottsass (14 September 1917 – 31 December 2007) was an Innsbruck-born Italian architect and designer of the late 20th century. He founded the Memphis Group and was a member briefly flirted with the Situationist International for a (very) short time. He was also connected to the radical design movement. His best-known product is the 1969 Olivetti Valentine typewriter. His 1981 “Carlton Cabinet” was to many people their first de facto exposure to postmodernism.

Sottsass founded the Memphis Group, an influential postmodern Italian design and architecture movement of the 1980s. Memphis explored a visual language outside of the limiting canons of “good taste,” blurring the boundaries between “high culture” and mass-produced “ordinary” consumer goods.

Radical design developed in Italy in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It continued the tradition of using new materials and bold colours that began with Pop Art but also drew on historical styles such as Art Deco, Kitsch, and Surrealism. The main exponents of Radical Design were small groups of architects and designers who questioned Modernism and rejected mass-consumer culture. Key groups and designers of the Radical style include Superstudio, Archizoom Associati, UFO, Gruppo Strum, and Ettore Sottsass.

Icons of erotic art #10

As we have learnt from the first nine issues in this series, in the nebulous realm of erotic art, uneroticism runs rampant. Not with the photos I am about to present. NSFW, previously unpublished online, here is Unica Zürn photographed by Hans Bellmer [1].

Previous entries in Icons of Erotic Art here, and in a Wiki format here.

Karlheinz Stockhausen (1928 – 2007)

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Sbs6wb2Fnc&]

Clickable version

Superb juxtapoem of image-to-music by Youtuber Zapple 101

Does anyone know which Karlheinz Stockhausen piece is on the audio track?

Update: regarding my previous question, the piece is “Mikrophonie 0.1”, here is more from Mikrophonie. (Studie II, 1954)