Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
I'm a big fan of the cultural provocateur Camille Paglia and pretty much think that she's said everything there is to say about culture, art, and academia at the moment. But her stance on pornography is something that I could never get my head around. She believes that pornography—from kiddie porn to bondage—is art. "Pornography and art are identical for me," she has said. "I think Michelangelo is a pornographer." I've really tried to see her side of this issue, and have even defended pornography as free speech, but I can't defend pornography as art. Pornography is either completely manufactured and commercial (see Playboy) or it is just gross (see everything else).
You're probably wondering where all this is coming from--why am I writing a post about pornography? Well, I came across (in The Daily Beast) a recently launched magazine that's making me think twice. That's because this magazine, which tastefully and evocatively features images of female nudity, is unlike the Maxims and Playboys of the world. Treat!, as the magazine is called, was founded by photographer Steve Shaw, 45, "to create something beautiful . . . My thought was, let’s do a magazine that shows women tastefully. Let’s take these beautiful models, take all the things that they are selling off, and do something creative.” He goes on to say, “Maxim had become the place where an aspiring actress will wear a cheesy bikini, ‘Get your boobs out and bend over’—and they don’t even want to do that. A lot of magazines feature nudity for shock value. And it’s disposable. I thought, ‘Who am I going to shoot for? [Expletive deleted] it! I’m going to start my own magazine.’”
Yes, the magazine can be pretentious and self-consciously artsy, but I give it an A for responding—artistically—to the vulgarity of today's porn industry. The women in these shoots don't look like pained or cheesy or manufactured hunks of meat (or silicone, as the case may be). They look beautiful. Treat! has been called "high fashion's Playboy," but I see it as a more erotic extension of Vogue. Since you probably don't want to click to the magazine's webpage when you're at work, let me show you a few of the more G-rated (ok, more like PG-13) photographs so you can judge for yourself.
The magazine's cover image (not pictured) shows the second model above posing naked near a river or lake. It is not, we are told, "airbrushed or photographically retouched. You can see a minute halo of body hair on her legs and breasts—something almost unheard of in the world of fashion photography, or even porn." This is woman in her natural state. And, as Paglia would be the first to tell you, nature is the sacred realm of women--and sex.
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Dec '11
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
My favorite quote about pornography: During the Reagan administration, Attorney General Edwin Meese chaired a commission to study pornography.
After one particular session, when a group of eminent jurists had watched a film featuring men sword-fighting with their penises, one of the commissioners turned to another and said, "I don't know if that's obscene, but it's stupid."
Nov '10
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
The problem is that what is considered pornographic - or better yet, obscene - as well as what is considered bad art is highly subjective. What was considered obscene in some periods is high art in others. For example, Michelangelo's David was first displayed with metal fig leaves covering his nether regions; Rembrandt's etchings Ledikant and Monk in a Cornfield were considered scandalous by many , Courbet's Origin of the Universe and Manet's Olympia, were also considered both bad and somewhat obscene. Access to Japanese Shunga was pretty restricted until the 1980's or so, despite its aesthetic qualities and its historic value in Eastern art. A good deal of Lautrec's work is frankly pornographic, if one uses the actual definition of pornography, and is yet a high point in humane art. The list is pretty endless.
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
Porn can be art, but probably isn’t most of the time - it doesn’t intend to be art, or aspire to be art. It’s lotsa bouncin’ jolly-bits to titillate the Onanist-America demographic, and that’s that. It can have elements of art - composition, narrative direction - as well as the technical rudiments you find in movies or photos that aspire to make an artistic statement, but that doesn’t make it art, anymore than a man getting down on his hands and knees makes him a dog.
Paglia’s not stupid; she knows that there’s pr0n she’d consider artless, but what better way to start a conversation and make people walk crab-ways towards admitting that some naughty stuff has redeeming aesthetic values? Just because something stirs a base emotion hardly disqualifies it from being a work of art; it might mean that the jolted emotion is connected with shame or regret. War movies and horror flicks poke the id just as hard, but since they provide relief of a different sort - triumph, survival - they get a pass.
That said, there’s a biiiig difference between “Saving Private Ryan” and “Saving Ryan’s Privates.”
May '10
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
I think this "art" approach to nudity is doomed in the USA. Americans are Puritans. Pleasure is sin and Americans cannot look at those pictures without feeling a little guilty.
Dec '10
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
I am sorry Emily but the answer is NO!
The problem with pornography is not what the images are but what they are degrading. The relationship between a man and a woman in mystical jewish tradition is of the ultimate importance and sanctity. The belief is literally that Gd created a single soul that had both components. This was accomplished before the Universe began. When a child is brought into this world the soul is divided into two halves, male and female and the appropriate half is placed in the body. The earthly mission of the person is to find their 'beshert' the other half of the their soul and reunite the two halves in holy matrimony.
I am not suggesting that you accept High Jewish Mysticism instantaneously. What I am suggesting is that at the very core of Western Civilization's value system the relationship of Man and Woman is of Supreme Signifigance.
To degrade this by reducing either Man or Woman to a mere physical sexual object is aspiritual in the extreme. The odds that this will help you in life are very minimal and the odds that it will do you damage are maximal.(cont.)
Dec '10
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
(cont. from #45)
I am much older then you. Take my word for it. My generation is the "Sexual Revolution" generation. We believed in Sex like a Religion. Sex will set you free. Sex will heal you, I used to call Sex Rx. Sex will give you power. We were the generation that thought we knew all about everything and discovered we knew nothing about anything.
A man and a woman sleep with one another. They have not made a commitment first and they do not love one another. The next morning what happens? Does the man lose respect for the woman? Do they now fall in love because the sex was so fantastic? Does the woman want a better lover? (cont.)
Dec '10
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
(cont. from #46)
The correct answer from an old guy who has been there more then once is NOTHING! Yep absolutely nothing happens the next morning and that is what the problem is. What should have been the most beautiful, inspiring union that will last for the rest of your life has now been reduced to just one more trivial activity. Did you enjoy the movie, the dinner, the tennis, the boat ride, the music, the play, and oh yes did you enjoy the sex?
What's sex got to do with Love?
Feb '11
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
HalifaxCB
Mama Toad:
The tadpoles later asked me why so much of the art was naked. I told them it could be two reasons: 1. It is easier to draw or sculpt people with no clothes on because clothes are difficult to do well or 2. They were emphasizing the beauty of the human form. After a moment's consideration, my 5 and 8 year olds concurred with #1. · Jan 12 at 2:14pm
Actually, naked figures are much harder to draw than clothed, because it is much harder to cheat. The eye is very good at picking out errors in the figure, while with clothing, not so much.
From my own experience with art, I agree with you, but I was trying to come up with something to satisfy the questioning tadpoles.
Sep '10
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
I think Paglia views art as a reaction to and against mother nature. It's one reason why she believes men have been the great artists of history and not women, who do not feel the same inchoate defensiveness and insecurity about existence. Art, for her, reflects that struggle, as does the long trajectory of Western art.
May '11
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
Art encompasses everything in the universe. Every feeling and all that is spiritual and physical. Some art elevates us and engages our intellect. Some degrades and dehumanizes. Propaganda art the Nazis used was meant to bring out a dehumanizing hatred our souls are capable of for our fellow man. A skillfull pornographer knows the best angles and right lighting to makes their work as erotic as possible. An effective propogandist artist understands how to characterize somebody in the most dehumanizing way possible. Both use artistic methods to acheive their goals. Art does have an ugly and unpleasant side but ugly and unpleasant is still art.
Jan '11
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
From Roger Scruton's A Very Brief Introduction to Beauty, on the difference between pornography (which he uses disparagingly) and erotic art:
I think this is laying it on a little thick -- and ignores the significant the gradations within pornography -- but it's a remarkably elegant description: with erotic art, you're looking at an unclothed person; with pornography, merely an unclothed body. The latter isn't necessarily harmful, but it's hardly edifying, either.
Edited on Jan 13 at 7:08amJan '12
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
Drapery is to the Nude as fabric is to naked.
Drapery can be as difficult to produce as the Nude. This, of course, is not the point. The point is that the true Classical Figure engages a higher ideal of an intellectual Beauty. The Nude is sacred, naked is profane.
Mama Toad
HalifaxCB
Mama Toad:
The tadpoles later asked me why so much of the art was naked. I told them it could be two reasons: 1. It is easier to draw or sculpt people with no clothes on because clothes are difficult to do well or 2. They were emphasizing the beauty of the human form. After a moment's consideration, my 5 and 8 year olds concurred with #1. · Jan 12 at 2:14pm
Actually, naked figures are much harder to draw than clothed, because it is much harder to cheat. The eye is very good at picking out errors in the figure, while with clothing, not so much.
From my own experience with art, I agree with you, but I was trying to come up with something to satisfy the questioning tadpoles. · Jan 13 at 4:40am
Nov '10
Re: Sex, Art, and Camille Paglia
Mama Toad
From my own experience with art, I agree with you, but I was trying to come up with something to satisfy the questioning tadpoles. · Jan 13 at 4:40am
Anything that works! BTW, a book you (and others interested in the issue) might quite enjoy is Jonathan Jones' The Lost Battles. It centers on the competition between Michelangelo and Leonardo in early 16thC Florence, but really fills out the story with a very lively & readable (but thoroughly researched) look at their lives, the lives of their famous contemporaries (like Machiavelli), and Florentine society in general. There's also a good bit of discussion of artistic issues, including the birth of individual expression - as versus different flavours of craftsmanship - and he makes a point that in 1500 nudi just meant naked. It's quite fascinating (and won't upset even delicate natures).