More than 5000 join in at the Sydney Opera House
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March 18, 2010
March 2, 2010
Spencer Tunick
Ever wonder what the masses really think about public nudity? You need to have Spencer Tunick around to discover the hidden truth. Somehow, in the name of art, he gets past our misplaced facades and reveals the very soul of human nature.
From www.pedestrian.tv; by Ash
Nudity, after reality television and Karl Stefanovic is the final frontier of human shame. Since childhood we’re conditioned to associate nudity with a lack of morals or promiscuity and unless you’re a stripper, model, streaker or Taylor Lautner’s torso only a handful of people should see you naked on any given day. This morning however, five thousand Sydneysiders threw clothing and caution to the unseasonably chilly wind for a nude artwork by American photographer Spencer Tunick – creating a soon-to-be iconic image and shifting the paradigm of public nudity in Australia in the process.
I mean, why is it acceptable for five thousand people to get naked for the sake of art but if five people tried disrobing at the Opera House steps tomorrow they’d be pepper sprayed like they abducted a bus-full of children? Or you could talk about how Tunick told strangers to kiss – with many interpreting his instructions as a spontaneous act of unity. Outside the context of high art – five thousand naked strangers making out in a public place would be viewed as the orgy precursor to the Apocalypse. But when framed by artistic intention some magical transformation takes place and nudity becomes a human interest story on the local news. Why is one illegal and one not? Who decides what’s appropriate and what’s not? And has the public threshold for nudity increased now that the SMH has posted a video with a thousand penises in it?
It’s something to think about and we’d love to hear your views but the more pertinent question might be how did this happen? I mean, it’s weird to think that one person can convince thousands of strangers halfway across the world to disrobe and blindly follow direction – but that’s Tunick’s M.O. exactly. After graduating from Art College in Boston, Tunick began shooting nudes in the late 80’s, gradually incorporating more participants and more iconic locations as his profile grew. In 2007 he shot 18.,000 nudes in Mexico City. This morning he shot a few thousand less at Sydney’s most recognizable Harbourside landmark. That’s the appeal I guess. To be part of something greater than yourself. To be immortalized in art. To forge a tangible record of your existence. Or…people just like getting naked and seeing other people naked. But you’d be wrong if to assume Tunick’s aim is to titillate. In his world human bodies are brush strokes and nudity a symbol for human homogeneity. From a distance we’re all the same says Tunick and looking at his photos you tend to agree.
What’s even stranger, considering the democracy of it all, is that Tunick remains fully clothed throughout the shoot’s duration. He barks orders from a microphone on a raised platform while racing against the light to conjure his magic. Pedestrian recently caught up with starkers participant Koots, 23, unemployed, for an insider’s view on taking it all off in the name of art.
Interview with Koots:
First question Koots – what compelled you to strip with a few thousand strangers?
It was just a chance to do something I wouldn’t usually do. Any other time legally, you’d get in trouble but all of a sudden it was cool to just strip off in public – it’s a pretty crazy double standard.
And was there much diversity in the crowd?
There were heaps of young people and a bunch of older people as well. It was pretty much 50/50 men and women – it wasn’t just like old dirty men. It was pretty even actually, all different people from all different backgrounds. From people you wouldn’t expect to crazy old men who were tattooed head to toe.
And how did it work logistically?
We got there at 4am and they organized everyone into different groups. Then they give you instructions on where to stand and how it’s going to work. Then they give the green light and thousands of people get their kit off and take their positions. Then he (Tunick) just goes through a variety of poses – facing one way, facing the other, lying down with you head in the crotch of the person behind you. There was one where he told everyone to kiss the person next to them regardless of whether it was a man or a woman – whatever. Then after that we went into the concert hall of the Opera House and he did another one where everyone was sitting down.
Where did you put your clothes?
January 17, 2010
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. December 1, 2009
Of the Many Depictions of Adam & Eve
Michelangelo’s is my favorite . . .
And there are hundreds more. Most artists, believe it or not, avoided nudity. Including a few with fig leaves, some of the exceptions:
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September 1, 2009
Henry Scott Tuke
If there are artists that present day artists aspire to emulate, Henry Scott Tuke would be one of them.
Born in York, England in 1858, he died at age seventy in 1929.
In 1874 Tuke’s family moved to London, where he enrolled in the Slade School of Art. After graduating he traveled to Italy in 1880 , and from 1881 to 1883 he lived in Paris, where he studied with the French history painter Jean-Paul Laurens and met the American painter John Singer Sargent (who was also a painter of male nudes, although this fact was little known in his lifetime).
His motivation to paint teenage boys is unknown. For me the images are reminiscent of my own youth, those carefree, innocent days of exploring the world around us, uninhibited by self-imposed shame and the dictates of moral autocrats. Although Tuke’s paintings of nude youths undoubtedly appealed to those gay men who found adolescents attractive, they are never explicitly sexual. The models’ genitals are almost never shown, they are almost never in physical contact with each other, and there is never any suggestion of overt sexuality.
During the 1880s Tuke also met Oscar Wilde and other prominent poets and writers, most of them homosexual (then usually called Uranian) who celebrated the adolescent male. He wrote a “sonnet to youth” which was published anonymously in The Artist, and also contributed an essay to The Studio.
August 13, 2009
Brian Biedul
It never ceases to amaze me how talented artists find new way to compose their work, especially when the subject is the human form. Such an artist is Brian Biedul. Here he combines an element of architecture with the human body in his Cubes and Squares series.
Brian Biedul was born in Colorado Springs in 1955. He spent the better part of his adolescence in Europe where his love of art began. While living in Paris he was enrolled in his first art class under the instruction of Siegfried Hahn. After returning to America he spent time in various cities across the United States including New York, Chicago and Los Angeles where he later settled. In 1984 he graduated with a BFA from Art Center College of Design where he later taught Saturday figure drawing classes.
Biedul’s artistic development can be divided into several periods. In his early years he began with figurative painting in oils influenced heavily by the Dutch Masters. Later he began creating works of abstract expressionism influenced by the works of Mark Rothko and Franz Kline. He followed that period with installations and earthworks in the desert where his idea of Theoretical Architecture was born. Through this experimentation he found the content that would define his future work.
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June 13, 2009
The Powerful Art of Thomas Eakins
Thomas Eakins
By age twelve, growing up in Philadelphia, Eakins was already displaying his talent for art. After studying art in Pennsylvania and Paris, finding himself more interested in human anatomy than the Impressionist movement, he went on to develop his anatomically precise style.
A letter to his father in 1868 made his fascination with the human body clear: She [the female nude] is the most beautiful thing there is in the world except a naked man, but I never yet saw a study of one exhibited … It would be a godsend to see a fine man model painted in the studio with the bare walls, alongside of the smiling smirking goddesses of waxy complexion amidst the delicious arsenic green trees and gentle wax flowers & purling streams running melodious up & down the hills especially up. I hate affectation.
How one can look at art such as Eakins and still find the human body shameful or anything other than nature’s finest work, is beyond me.
Eakins is credited with bringing photography in to the world of art. With these college students, he captures the beauty of the male form, human energy, and male camaraderie.
The Swimming Hole (1884-5) (above), is considered his finest study of the nude. The figures involved were his students and friends.
Makes you wonder why anyone would want to wear clothes.
A photograph of Thomas Eakins (left) and a friend.
Below, Thomas Eakins carrying a woman.
May 9, 2009
Felix d’Eon
The moment you enter Felix’s website, you realize you have discovered a magical place. Next thing you know, if you ever wished you could live another life, it would be something like his.
Get the picture? Just read a little about him, or take a look at the pictures of his studio. He lives in a male fantasy land.
What else could inspire such beautiful images?
Rob in Wait
You wonder what it would be like to pose for him, to live next door and get into his mind. You wonder what’s inside such a talented artist’s head.
Southern Exposure
Felix was born in Guadalajara, Mexico where he still spends much of his time. Some of his work is from his memories and experiences there.
Boys From Chiapas
The next one is from Felix d’Eon’s Arcadian series.
The Concert
Another from the Arcadian series.
Sliding Down
A sample from Felix’s History Gallery.
A Little 18th Century Decadence
One from a collection Felix calls Mythology & Folklore.
Dulcissime Study
Felix d’Eon, as fascinating as his work.
Felix d’Eon was born in Guadalajara, Mexico to a Mexican mother and a French father. He moved to America by the age of 5, and spent his childhood and teenage years moving around Southern Californian and Mexico. His mother, a fashion designer, was very accepting of his homosexuality and encouraging of his artistic inclinations, so at 18 he moved to San Francisco where he has lived ever since, with long breaks spent in Tennessee, New Orleans, Hawaii, and Hollywood. He attended the Academy of Art University, a school that emphasizes classical technique, and he graduated 4 years ago with honors. He put himself through school and worked for some years afterwards as an artist’s model, but has recently found some measure of success as an artist, and has decided to devote himself full time to his craft.
Felix at work in his gallery.
For more about Felix d’Eon and his art visit www.felixdeon.com
