“This is not pornography”

[jen337]

Police called to Hay-on-Wye gallery over painting of naked woman in window.

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2024/sep/20/police-called-to-hay-on-wye-gallery-after-it-puts-painting-of-naked-woman-in-window

“Officers went to the gallery after complaints that the painting, which features a naked woman wearing cowboy boots, her legs splayed to reveal a black triangle with pink wool on top, is not art but pornography.”

“Police had asked the painting be moved further inside the gallery, but Harris said she was “making a stand”. She said she was shocked to be told about the complaints, but that support online had been “massive” – “around 90% pro and 10% anti”, she said.”

Discuss.

My view is that the artist is correct, there’s nothing intrinsically offensive about a naked body, and there are are many depictions of the female form deemed acceptable, the famous and well loved little mermaid and countless other statues in public places, the many works of William Etty that hang in major galleries, Manet’s Olympia, etc. Although, I will admit this is not particularly “good” art, it’s still valid, and it might will have been deliberately placed to be provocative and court controversy, in which case it’s worked and highlights the hypocrisy.

I'm off, I'm about to get hiccups with laughing at all of this. It's made my night
😂😂 🤣

Thanks, mine too! 🤣

It’s not a rubbish piece of art. But then again beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder.

But thar aside, it is an inappropriate piece of ‘art’ for family viewing.

This country’s morals seem to be onto a race to the bottom in the name of being liberal and modern.

It got a newly opened gallery in a rather sleepy but beautiful town of books a huge amount of free publicity.

My mind keeps putting the title of this thread to the tune of Bowie's This is Not America.

@ChardonnaysBeastlyCat I suppose it doesn't HAVE to be pretty but I'd love it if art was beautiful again! There's already far too much ugliness in this world, so why the insistence on wilfully adding to it! Also, when modern ugly art is put along side beautiful art e.g. Renaissance works, it just looks rubbish to most people!

Just to add to the debate. If it's not pornographic or sexual, but empowering or just showing the human form, how would people genuinely feel about the painting If it was of a child (obviously minus the pubic hair). Would that change things and if so why?

@Scentedjasmin fab point, I was thinking similar. There's a very weird perception that has arisen in younger generations than me that is it somehow empowered or freeing to present in a sexualised manner and to be open to anything....it's a perspective through a male lens.

That image goes by the title "It's Party Time" so I wonder how the artist wanted us to read this.

The artist: "Most straight women haven’t seen a vulva, so I see why they might be scared of it. And it’s proving to me that there must be a lot of straight people here in Hay."
Quite an assumption.
The 'black triangle' isn't a good painting of a vulva, it's a sort of short-hand equivlent of "cock and balls" so it's not that that people are not liking. Crop the vuvla into a 10" x 10" painting and everyone would have walked straight past it. It's the schoolboy male gaze, the objectification, the decapitation that makes it uncomfortable.
"In my opinion, all the women that have something bad to say about the painting aren’t grossed out so much as insecure."
She's entitled to her opinion, and so confident in it, but that's not what I'm not taken with the image. Malene Dumas paints just as graphically, more so, but gives the sitter the power.
"When I started painting it I didn’t have one thought in my head thinking this would even get commented on."
She deliberately painted a female body this way because she thinks it's so uncommon to see vulvas in art and then didn't for a moment think it would get commented on in the front window of a small town?
I'm uncomfortable that this painting has had so much publicity, a little worried that such a young artist at the beginning of her career is now not in control of the story it's becoming. I think it could have been presented in a less confrontational way but isn't a matter for the police.

"Most straight women haven’t seen a vulva, so I see why they might be scared of it. And it’s proving to me that there must be a lot of straight people here in Hay."

Straight women are scared of vulvas. Righty ho.

Honestly, what total bollocks.

Most straight women have access to a mirror.

''Most straight women have access to a mirror.''

Dammit, I just forked out a small fortune for a portrait in oils.

😂

And most straight men are familiar with this particular view!

I don't know if anyone's mentioned this already, but the artist is the niece of the gallery owner.

I don't think the artist has seen a vulva either if she if that's what she thinks it looks like 🤣

She sounds very naive. Feminist artists have been doing this sort of stuff for years do you remember when someone took all those photos of different labia and put them on display? And the person who started knitting vulvas to be made into brooches? And the artist who made ceramic vulvas?

I'm not saying that she shouldn't do it too, but I just think she sounds like she thinks she's the first person to have ever done it.

Don’t know. Just not very good, ugly imo.

Ahh , I saw some pics of them standing together and thought they looked alike…so the person who posted upthread about nepo-babies was actually correct!

I quite like this too

Exactly.

Someone else was casting them in plaster.

Hay on Wye must be in the arsenal end of nowhere if they think this is ''shocking''.

The Courbet and Schiele examples have certainly attracted a lot of criticism over the years, but there I think there resemblance ends as love them or hate them, the amount of technical skill involved is of a different league.

That picture was put in the window for one reason, to get the response that it has and for that to be used as part of the artists PhD thesis. She's had her 15 minutes of infamy and I hope it serves her well for the future, because I'm not seeing a huge amount of artistic talent there.

I think most could do very much better than that silly daub.

It's like it has been 'painted' with left over discarded bits of paint found in a skip with an equally dried out, distorted brush.

It's clearly been done with an eye to getting free publicity - Especially as it's now known that the gallery owner is related to the artist.

Probably self reported to the police to get maximum coverage.

What a complete waste of police time.

Freud's nudes , while not 'pretty' have technical skill and sharp observation.

Right down to the dog's nails.

What jen377 said! (Beat me to it).

God forbid kids should not go to art galleries... https://www.musee-orsay.fr/en

'Origin of the World' by Gustave Courbet- World's apart in technical skill.

Incomparable.

The portraits of men, too are done with a real understanding of anatomy.

And, has to be done, I recommend the marvellous Tom Lehrer's song 'Smut' on Youtube. (Albeit more about litrature. And stained glass windows,) Interesting how much it's dated, mind you... Plus my original link won't play - you'll need to search.

Edited.

"In my opinion, all the women that have something bad to say about the painting aren’t grossed out so much as insecure."

The arrogance is astounding! I would say that I am most definitely not insecure about female genitalia, including my own. I am sufficiently secure and confident to call out total bullshit, when a shite painting depicts a headless woman in a highly sexualised pose. The artist may not associate the image with the sort of denigrating misogynistic crap that many women deal with, due to her own sexuality. Her experience is personal. She also is very young and immature and without the experience of raising children herself. That changes how we view the world around us. I have no problem with nudity at all. But the presentation of this image is through a sexualised and unempowering lense.