Evening Standard refers to painting of older woman as "this ancient crone...ghastliness of ageing flesh... this repellent body."

Brian Sewell has, er, issues. I would actually rather read him slagging off perfectly unexceptionable paintings of naked women's bodies than lingering in gruesome detail over depictions of male genitalia ('the glans, glistening softly in the delicate chiaroscuro while a light shadow falls over the scrotum' etc etc - honestly, he often writes things like this).

Blimey. I read the description and thought it would be one of those grotesque meaty nude paintings - Francis Bacon or Jenny Saville style.

Then I scrolled down and was that it was a sympathetic portrait of a perfectly normal somewhat saggy woman,just like me.

What a cock.

The business of her head looking too small .....I think it is that lollipop headed celebrities have become the norm.

I read the description to DH and then showed him the painting. He was shocked. It's just a perfectly normal older woman not the gruesome hag described. He's bewildered that anyone can have a career in art criticism when they're so obviously crap at describing things accurately. It's an offensive description, but worse it's offensive and inaccurate.

Yes bronze, it did sound as if Brian Sewell had seen you naked!!

Was about to chuck you out of the sisterhood

Sorry I had put dh had met but rephrase the sentence and now it looks like I'm talking bout meeting Brian s

I was wondering if he had seen less real older women because he is gay.
I mean I'm 31 and still not too saggy or wrinkly but I'm not the 18 year old he met and he's seen that progression and will see me as things so further south just as I will see him age. So he won't be freaked out by it. But if your only experience of women's bodies are rare or are the ones projected by the media you're going to see things differently.
(I may be wrong he may see
Older women naked all the time for some reason or other I don't actually know)

I think he's just revolted by women isn't he

:o

Was there a hint of sarcasm in that last post?

maybe it's because brian sewell is such a bronzed muscle-bound adonis when naked that he feels able to judge a woman about his age like this.

I read this article last night and thought the language used by BS (what an apt acronym) was hateful. I don't find the painting great but the woman in it looks pretty normal to me, not repellent.

*love it

I keep coming back to it because I actually live it. There are few paintings of people I like but this one has caught me.
Looking at her lower tummy I see life not death.

Right, studied self naked. I think it's because I'm just not used to large, natural breasts then. . I expect Brian isn't either!

Bloody hell I read the description then saw the pcture (as I'm sure they wanted you to) and was expecting something really grotesque. I saw...a woman. Who looks like a normal woman, not a porn star. And that's grotesque is it?

It's because her breasts are lower thn you're probably expecting.

Ooh gosh! My belly button is at the same level of my elbows?! Why doesn't it look right to me then? Are her arms too long? Shoulders to narrow?

God god, I missed "the lividity of death about her lower quarters". And how about "the eyes purblind, the slight smile a rictus." Sheesh.

peoplesrepublic, when you mentioned that she hadn't modified her body with cosmetic procedures, I had a really strong impulse of feeling that her beauty was partly comprised by exactly that authenticity. We do have a sense of beauty as being something not wholly visual, but visual-as-a-manifestation-of-life-or-character. That puts it very badly, but there is some sense in which the authenticity of her body, and the fact that it displays her long experience of life is part of its beauty, not an independent value that compensates for a lack of beauty.

That lady's eyes really twinkle, she looks like she'd be a really nice person to have a cuppa with. Brian Sewell's eyes... Hmm not so much! He is the only man to convincingly manage a catsbum mouth and have it as his byline pic, and his sniffy joyless moans are depressing.

"no sympathy gentles the stark observation of every detail, nor is desire roused; instead, this painting stimulates revulsion." "the lividity of death about her lower quarters"

It seems that he views women's bodies as purely sexual, they should evoke desire and lust, or, if they fail in that respect, then sympathy. A realistic painting of a older woman repulses him because it doesn't fit in with his view of how women should be portrayed. The language he uses is derogatory and vile. It's just a painting of an older woman, I do wonder how if he views his own body with the same revulsion....

One of the comments in the Standard says that 'his review says more about him than the painting' and I think that's spot on.

i think she looks beautiful, and i really mean that.

from going to saunas here in holland i'm quite used to seeing both sexes naked of all ages shapes and sizes, she is a realistic portait.

her belly button is a little high i suppose but thast hardly offensive.

she isnt 18-30 hasnt been nipped/tucked/bleached/shaved/plucked/waxed. no wonder people are offended, they are being confronted with reality.

Her belly button is at the same level as her elbows, which is where mine is. It just looks high because there's little distance between her belly button and the bottom of her breasts.

I don't understand the revulsion at all.

Her face is really beautiful -- wise and humorous and strong. He body is visually challenging only because we are so deprived of images of older people naked (and even of a realistic range of younger naked bodies). But it isn't ugle, not at all. I'd been expecting something difficult like a Lucian Freud nude, but the skin tones on this picture are warm and comfortable, and the shoulders, arms, hands and collarbone are all beautiful.

I don't understand why Sewell says ". ...no sympathy gentles the stark observation of every detail." It looks like a picture by someone who is very fond of the woman portrayed. The picture is called "Auntie." I wish she was my auntie.