Female genitalia..it's all over
Twitter..it's graphic, meat on the slab stuff. The pubic region waxed, plucked,
shaved, lasered, labia exposed, held wide open by manicured fingers...the face
is almost irrelevant, but she's invariably smiling..
I'm slightly bewildered about what
I am supposed think about these images? The photographer must want me feel
something... I feel nothing. I could take a feminist stance I suppose, and say that the
images exploit and degrade women, but I'm not going to. How about psychoanalysis?
I'm not going there either..I'm not even really interested in starting a
discussion about these images...they're there...get over it billierosie.
What I can say is that I don't find
the images, even slightly erotic. They don't turn me on and I think that it's
mostly because they don't tell a story...there's no narrative. There's not a
"what happens next" in sight, nothing is there beyond that one
graphic moment, they are frozen in time.
Here are some French vintage images that I purloined from the Web…I'm sure that in their time they
would have been considered shocking...but for me, they are lyrical, they have
class…there is a "what happens next"...my story, will be different to
yours, there are many diverse directions to meander, and that, for me, is where
the fascination lies.
And I neglected to add Courbet's wonderful painting "The Origin of the World" (1866)
Great post. Flashing one's genitals isn't necessarily sexy.
ReplyDeleteWell, actually, I like female genitals and think they should get more public air-time! This is also why I perform in The Vagina Monologues every year. Back in the 1980s (?), photographer Tee Corinne broke new ground by producing the kaleidoscopic photo images of vaginas in Yantras of Womanlove (also published as The Cunt Colouring Book). I don't think there has been an artwork like that since then. However, I also love the vintage French nudes you've posted - apples and oranges (or fish-and-chips vs. poulet au vin).
ReplyDeleteEven if women's labia, on their own, aren't exactly sexy (and I agree -- I prefer images that suggest a story), I find them intriguing, like snowflakes: no two the same, with an innocent charm. I think it still needs to be said that they're not disgusting or shameful. They've never harmed anyone, and they are the gate that all of us passed through when coming into the world from our mothers' wombs.
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