The naked women photo at the Repub convention pisses me off.

[cali]

Not because I have any objection to people posing naked, but because it's both a distraction and pointless. It's counterproductive. Here's Tunick's explanation. Pretentious, much?

The photograph will involve 100 nude women holding large mirror discs, reflecting the knowledge and wisdom of progressive women and the concept of “Mother Nature” into and onto the convention center, cityscape and horizon of Cleveland. The philosophy of the artwork relates to the idea of the sacred feminine. By holding mirrors, we hope to suggest that women are a reflection and embodiment of nature, the sun, the sky and the land. We want to express the belief that we will rely upon the strength, intuition and wisdom of progressive and enlightened women to find our place in nature and to regain the balance within it. The mirrors communicate that we are a reflection of ourselves, each other, and of the world that surrounds us. The woman becomes the future and the future becomes the woman.


This is from Jezebel's quite neutral piece. The responses, however, weren't so neutral.

Oh cool, white dude asking 100 women to pose nude for difficult-to-decipher performance peice about “the sacred feminine” for a bunch of people who are already too dense to give a shit about women. Thank you, smart arty man, for figuring out how to communicate for us! We should’ve just been holding up mirrors and taking off our clothes this whole time!

WOMEN—such strange, exotic creatures! Objects of nature! Magical beings of innate nurturing ability! Ugh.


More like the philosophy of the artwork speaks to the raging out of control narcissism of the artist and the participants.


Yeah, exactly. I fail to see how this furthers the cause or highlights the struggles of women at all. “raging out of control narcissism” aptly describes it, as stymie 99 said.

YES. The idea of the female nude as representative of something other than a person - purity, nature, whateverthefuck - is old as shit and only reinforces women as symbols not symbolized. Not only is the project unhelpful and regressive, it’s conceptually fucking boring.


Am I the only one who just straight-up hates the idea of woman as reflection of the earth? That’s some sexist bullshit. Men are intelligent and powerful and build things, women create life and reflect the natural order. I was kinda hoping this would be a pro-reproductive rights statement about how Republicans are afraid of women’s bodies and so on.

Many more scathing comments that are right on.

http://theslot.jezebel.com/join-100-women-posing-naked-at-the-republican-national-1776227577

[romanic]

1. The Jezebel comment section

is like the far-left version of Yahoo commentary; only remove the vile racism with juvenile sanctimoniousness. This is nothing new, they're never happy.

[cali]

2. Do you disagree with the comments I posted?

[Major Nikon]

40. Not really

Personally I don't think much about this artist's work, but the purpose was obviously to generate a conversation or at least a thought process on the subject. It seems to have already met that goal and it hasn't even been done yet. So what I think about it, or what you think about it, or what the perennially pissed off comment section of jezebel thinks about it simply provides a proof that the project is working exactly as intended.

[global1]

3. Rince Prebis (sp) Probably Requested This As A Way To....

lure Repugs into attending the convention.

[Katashi_itto]

4. I dont think it was munch of a statement.

More like self promotion under the guise of being "profound"

[cali]

7. Snap. Exactly.

[Katashi_itto]

8. I direct movies. It looked pretty evident right off the bat. Thanks for the link! I wasn' familia

with Jezebel

[n2doc]

13. +1 n/t

[DLevine]

5. I agree with you.

Nothing expresses female empowerment better than 100 naked women at a Republican convention.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

6. Get 100 men to pose naked if you want to get the Republicans Really Excited :) . . . nt

[snort]

27. Posing in bathroom stalls.

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

9. Meh, everyone is a critic n/m

[cali]

10. It's not about artistic merit.

[Vinca]

11. I wish it would be 100 nude trans women.

The Republicans would probably close their convention and move it to a megachurch.

[MillennialDem]

39. Well, after going on google to view the images and jerk it a few times

[apcalc]

12. I'm with you. Objectifying women IMO. Screw that .

[porkified]

14. black out

black out all the naughty parts and tell them there is a tran in there and they will probably try to start a new war somewhere.

[stonecutter357]

15. looks like it is Pissing OFF All The RIGHT People..

[DLevine]

17. No, it's pissing off the LEFT people. nt

[stonecutter357]

18. no it's not...

[cali]

19. It's pissing off feminists

[stonecutter357]

20. all artists should be doing something else - like whatever you pick.

[cali]

24. Silly strawman

[stonecutter357]

25. who exactly made you the interpreter of art for the rest of us?

[cali]

29. Shockingly, I'm expressing my opinion on a board expressly designed

for that very reason.

And, in any case, I'm not commenting on the value of artistic merit.

[7962]

23. So-called "artists" always try to piss off people to seem "edgy"

It gets them press.
Its all a bunch of bullshit and you've shown us another fine example

[Major Nikon]

41. Air conditioning pisses off feminists

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/11760417/Air-conditioning-in-your-office-is-sexist.-True-story.html

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

16. "it's both a distraction and pointless"

Agreed, but the same could be said of most "flash mob" appearances.

An artist is seeking publicity. No news there.

[Chemisse]

21. I don't care one way or the other - except ...

Trump will think all these women are groupies who want to have sex with him. And that makes me sick.

[smirkymonkey]

42. Yes, this.

The message will be lost on him.

[marble falls]

22. But its yuge! World class! Never been done before with more than 99 women even at the Trump Casinos!

[Matrosov]

26. It'll piss off the religious nuts

...and that's fine with me. In their minds, nudity = sex = sin

Unless we're talking about naked little boys, then a lot of those religious nuts seem strangely alright with it

[Bluenorthwest]

28. And Tunick has been doing work of this sort for decades, over 90 public installations.....

This page has photos of several of the past events. He's got ongoing exhibitions, upcoming major civic projects in three countries.
I have as yet to meet any successful artist in any field that was not self promotional and pretentious at times. He sure fits that bill with this verbiage, but again that's sort of how that world turns.
http://spencertunick.com/installations

Here is the sign up page for his upcoming photo shoot in Hull, UK:
"Ferens Art Gallery is pleased to announce a site specific commission by Spencer Tunick. The internationally renowned New York based artist will gather hundreds of naked people to take part in a series of photographic installations in the city centre on 9 July 2016.

In response to Hull’s maritime history Tunick’s participants will wear body paint to reference the colours of the sea found in the Ferens Art Gallery’s paintings. Sea of Hull will be presented at the gallery in 2017, during the UK City of Culture year.

Take part in this unique art event and temporarily transform the city streets. Each participant will receive a limited edition print of the installation as a permanent record of involvement. You will only be naked for a short period of time.
Tunick has created over 90 art installations over 20 years in some of the most culturally significant landmarks around the world from the Sydney Opera House to Mexico City. His work challenges preconceived notions of nudity and the culturally charged, often negative, connotations associated with it. This is Spencer Tunick’s first project in Hull."
http://www.hull2017.co.uk/whatson/events/seaofhull/

[Bluenorthwest]

33. And yet none of the comments in thread indicate any knowledge of the artist's work

So the comments are being made without context. In thread, many of the comments claim the artist is seeking attention, but the artist is world famous and strongly established. All artists promote their own work, they all sound pretentious when they do it.

If you hate modern art that's your choice as a shimmering intellect. But it is also just your opinion.

[cali]

34. The op is not about the artistic merit of Tunick's work

I like some of his photos quite a bit, but that's irrelevant. I do think his explanation for the photo is annoying, pretentious and unwittingly sexist.

[Bluenorthwest]

38. The comment I responded to here is about 'modern art' being terrible.

I think the OP and then the thread is devoid of context, it presents this RNC event as if it was being done by an unknown attempting to gain status by using nude women. It fails to point out that his work has been full of nude women and nude men, young and old alike, for his entire career.

I think it's great if people want to say 'modern art is nasty porno' but I do think that such discussions should include the information that the art world does not agree, that the artist in question has a great deal of status in the art world and is constantly and internationally commissioned. This means that some people do not think 'this is that porno modern arts stuff' and the curators and gallery owners opinions are at least as valid as those of people on DU who had never heard of Tunick and who think art needs to be very old representational oil paintings in a tasteful frames hung in State Museums.

Yes, his verbiage is pretentious. Go listen to Dali sometime. It's part of the art thing:

“Every morning when I wake up, I experience an exquisite joy —the joy of being Salvador Dalí— and I ask myself in rapture: What wonderful things is this Salvador Dalí going to accomplish today?”
― Salvador Dalí

If it's humility you seek, look outside the art world....

[LuvLoogie]

31. Sounds like another "epic, stunning statement" I "need to understand."

What if it's a cloudy day? And how big are these mirrors going to be? Will they be framed? How long do they have to hold these mirrors up? Why am I thinking about this too much?

[Agnosticsherbet]

32. The artist is the creator of beautiful things.

To reveal art and conceal the artist is art’s aim.
The critic is he who can translate into another manner or a new material his impression of beautiful things.
The highest, as the lowest, form of criticism is a mode of autobiography.
Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming. This is a fault.
Those who find beautiful meanings in beautiful things are the cultivated. For these there is hope.
They are the elect to whom beautiful things mean only Beauty.
There is no such thing as a moral or an immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written. That is all.
The nineteenth century dislike of Realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in a glass.
The nineteenth century dislike of Romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in a glass.
The moral life of man forms part of the subject-matter of the artist, but the morality of art consists in the perfect use of an imperfect medium.
No artist desires to prove anything. Even things that are true can be proved.
No artist has ethical sympathies. An ethical sympathy in an artist is an unpardonable mannerism of style.
No artist is ever morbid. The artist can express everything.
Thought and language are to the artist instruments of an art.
Vice and virtue are to the artist materials for an art.
From the point of view of form, the type of all the arts is the art of the musician. From the point of view of feeling, the actor’s craft is the type.
All art is at once surface and symbol.
Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril.
Those who read the symbol do so at their peril.
It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors.
Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital.
When critics disagree the artist is in accord with himself.
We can forgive a man for making a useful thing as long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.
All art is quite useless.

- Preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray byOscar Wilde.

[cali]

35. One more time, this isn't about artistic merit.

Love OW, btw

[Agnosticsherbet]

36. I, too, like OW.

I think of it as being about Art.
There is a great deal of art that has no merit.
Merit isn't necessary.

[Major Nikon]

43. I'm not sure how you can reconcile that

Calling it counterproductive pretty much makes it about this artist's merit.

[JHB]

44. Ridiculous and irrelevant

[apnu]

45. I feel you. Its dumb.

Also Trump and most male consevatives are misogynist pricks. They'll miss the point entirely and be happy looking at naked women and judging them in ugly sexual ways.

[MisterP]

46. my main concern is what'll happen if the sun's out and the mirrors aren't all perfectly parallel