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.

Ode to MTV and the contemporary grotesque

If – as Adonis Kyrou contended – “the modern marvelous is popular, and the best and most exciting films are, beginning with Méliès and Fantômas, the films shown in local fleapits” – the contemporary marvelous is shown in video games and on MTV. I’m not an video game expert, but have been a big fan of MTV since its inception, and it still is my favorite television station, celebrating the wonder of visual culture hour after hour.

So if the modern marvelous is popular, the modern grotesque is popular as well.

Here is an example of those sensibilities we look for in visual culture: “Perfect”, a single by Princess Superstar. The sound is similar to Bodyrox‘s “Yeah Yeah”, the visuals (the make-up of the ladies) fit our bill.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZl165WDjDA

“Perfect” by Princess Superstar

And here is the clip by Bodyrox I referred to.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w8YqHu3k7pU

“Yeah Yeah” by Bodyrox (uncensored version)

Icons of erotic art #12 and 13

Dedicated to the phrase: “his hands were all over me.”
My guess is that many of you will be familiar with Hokusai’s print, but far less of you with the very similarly themed work by Rops. Enjoy.

Dream of the fisherman's wife by hokusai
La Pieuvre (Octopus) by Félicien Rops

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

World cinema classics #34

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

Tokyo Decadence (1992) – Ryu Murakami

This is a film I chose in the mid 1990s at the video store because of its cover, not being familiar at the time with the work of Murakami (Coin Locker Babies). The key scenes are four sex scenes (see more at the wiki). Three out of these heavily feature drugs. The most exquisite one, featured in the Youtube remix above, is soundtracked by Xavier Cugat music. The audio used in this particular Youtube remix is not included in the original film. I wonder what the music is. Anyone? (De temps en temps is a song (André Hornez / Paul Misraki) voiced by Josephine Baker.)

The film’s only rival in terms of my favourite film of the 1990s is the Japanese film Audition, which is also written by Murakami.

Previous “World Cinema Classics” and in the Wiki format here.

Ugly plants

Just a quick note to ask you for an image identification. I am currently “investigating” aesthetic universalism and relativism, see prev post. I came across the photo below by googling for “ugly plants”:

Moss on rocks unidentified photograph

Please help me identify the name of this moss species

Ugliness in nature is best represented by the notion of the sublime. But there are many animals and plants out there which we just plain consider ugly, without an inkling of sublimity. See for example the Komodo dragon, and this.

If you know of more pointers, please let me known.

The moss photo was probably taken at Bolivia’s  salt flat Salar de Uyuni, see this photo.

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.