Gustave Doré

Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustave_Dor%C3%A9

 January 6, 1832 – January 23, 1883) was a French artist, engraver, illustrator and sculptor. Prolific artist. Some of his most reknowned illustrations were his work on The Divine Comedy.

Mary Woronov

A few years back I was walking through the isles of Barnes & Noble and I found a book that got my attention. "Wake for the angels". I do love angels, which is why I stopped to look at it in the first place. But then I was captured by the paintings that illustrated the book: fluid bodies that look about to burst in flames or to disintegrate or to materialize outside the book. A strong dose of pesimism or realism. Stories with a strange mix of sarcasm, nostalgia, sadness. It was not really so much about angels, as it was about Los Angeles. I walked out with the book in my hand.

I was never too sure who the author was. At that time I had not been painting for a long while, and yet I found the paintings so inspiring. I loved the stories, and I loved just browsing through the pages, knowing that there was a sensibility there that I could not completely figure out but I could certainly enjoy.

Yesterday I wanted to look up the author of the book and see if she had anything else. Well, was that a surprise... You'll see. During the last two years I've been very interested in Andy Warhol, reading his books (Philosophy of Andy Warhol, Popism), books about him, a collection of his nudes... Watching "Factory Girl"... Anyway, absorbing everything I can about him. During the last couple of weeks I have also been in a very Lou Reed mood, listening to Lou and Metallica's new album, Lulu. Watching "Far away so close", in which Lou Reed has an important role. Listening to Nico.

So, was it surprising to learn that Mary Woronov, author of the book, also happened to be an important figure in the Andy Warhol scene!

American actress, artist and writer. "Mary Woronov first made headlines in the early 1960s as a Warhol superstar. She danced with Exploding Plastic Inevitable, Warhol's multimedia presentation of the Velvet Underground.

Woronov's notable appearances include in the 1975 cult film Death Race 2000 and 1979's Rock 'n' Roll High School (and the 1991 sequel Rock 'n' Roll High School Forever), but her breakthrough role was in the 1982 cult film Eating Raoul. " [Wikipedia]



Affair, by Mary Woronov



Demon, by Mary Woronov

They took George into the woods and tortured him for hours, by Mary Woronov

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Woronov

http://www.maryworonov.com/

http://www.amazon.com/Wake-Angels-Mary-Woronov/dp/1885203004

Joel-Peter Witkin

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Francesco Salomoni

Francesco Salomoni is an Italian artist currently residing in Florida. I first saw his works on eBay. His portfolio presents a few different styles, with some abstract paintings aside a number of female nudes. I just have to say that I found his paintings of nude females refreshing in their simplicity.

He also includes a number of drawings. Some of them appear to have been sketches for paintings, usually with a couple of minor differences. He also has an area dedicated to photography and a self-published photography book.

"Nude American Girl" by Francesco Salomoni.

Website: http://www.francescosalomoni.com

Completely Naked - Emotional Censorship

Completely Naked is a visual art initiative in London that, in their own words:

"Specialized in interactive installations, we explore live arts, visual, digital and time-based languages and our ideas are based on a curiosity for human behaviour from individual to collective responses. We create psychological conflicts to activate the partaker's reaction. We explore representations of the human body and challenge social boundaries around personal identity. Our work combines an interest in culture, psychology and communication with design by engaging public audiences in exciting methods of interactivity and art."

I find their projects fascinating, fearless in explore the taboo behind the identity, the privacy of the subject, and the need for self expression.

I'm sharing here a video that Completely Naked recently posted, from the Censura Emocional (Emotional Censorship) project in Portugal. I really recommend visiting their website, their facebook and their vimeo. You are in for an interesting trip!



Censura Emocional / FB / A8 from pau ros on Vimeo.
Website: http://www.completelynaked.co.uk/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Completely-Naked/190073984824?sk=info

Vimeo: http://vimeo.com/user313096

Let him who is without sin be the first to throw a stone

In a park in Armenia, Colombia, there was a performance called "El que esté libre de pecado que tire la primera piedra" ("Let him who is without sin be the first to throw a stone"). During the performance, an artist stripped nude and stood in front of a tree, as waiting for the stones to be thrown at him. Later on, he handed something (I'm not sure what, soap?).

During the performance, a reporter was completely outraged. He could not stop staring and yelling: "This is immoral! This might be a homosexual act!". Sure, the reporter showed a lot of ignorance and intolerance (and even homophobia) with his reaction, but wasn't that the point? To provoke, to bring those demons out of the human mind and expose them just as the artist exposed his body.

The reporter held his cell phone just as if he was holding the stone. Perhaps the modern stone is the cell phone used to throw the public forces against everything that we cannot accept.

Perhaps without this reaction the performance would have missed its mark. The sin wouldn't have been exposed. Intolerance, fear, repression, ignorance. Homophobia, but why homophobia? What is homosexual about a nude body? Perhaps the reporter becomes homosexual when he takes his clothes off to shower in the morning? Or does he shower with his eyes closed?

So, the video is obviously in Spanish, but the language of gestures is universal enough.

Luiz Gustavo Martins - Brazil

I almost don't know anything about Gustavo Martins. I found him through Flickr, where there is some brief biographical information:

"Degree in fine arts by Puc, I work in the area of illustration and participated in some halls of humor.
Later in 2010 I started to focus my work in the arts, where I realized I had more creative freedom than picturing memories from the past that hour mix with the realities today."

I love the innocence and matter of fact ways of his characters, and the strong, almost blocky compositions. His use of curtains, windows, walls etc to create the scene and frame is quite classical.


o dia das canções de amor de Aline Maria - " Aline Maria's love songs day"




retrato para Luzia,a cabrocha que abriu as portas do céu. - "picture for Luzia,the woman who opened the gates of heaven."
Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/martinsland/

Rodrigo Arenas Betancur - Colombian sculptor

Most known in Colombia and Mexico, I think he deserves to be more widely known. He created incredible sculptural groups, sometimes representing the independence battles in Colombia, sometimes just mankind rising to the height of their potential.

Rodrigo Arenas Betancur was born on October 23, 1919 in Fredonia, Antioquia. At the time of his death in 1995 he was recognized as one of the most important sculptors in Colombia and Latin America.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rodrigo_Arenas

Noewi

A great artist and a wonderful person, Noewi shares a lot of her creative process with her fans through the Facebook page. Her paintings are playful and naughty (but nice) expressions of intimacy, beauty, femininity and masculinity.
Personally, I love this one, which her fans were able to see evolve from the initial drawing to the final painting.
Exposed, by Noewi


Noewi (Jindra) was born and raised in Czech Republic, and currently resides in the Tampa Bay area. Besides her paintings, she creates murals and faux finish, and is available for commissions.

Website: http://noewisart.com/

Online store: http://jindra-noewi.fineartamerica.com/

eBay store: http://stores.ebay.com/Noewis-Art

Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/NoewiArtist?sk=info

Fannybunda @ Flickr

Bruce states in his profile: "many of my pictures involve nudity, I hope tastefully done. I believe that nudity need not be sexual. It can simply be an expression of the beauty and natural goodness of all creation"

"Photography is fun. It's a chance to express oneself and be creative in new ways. I like to experiment and try different things. But I also try not to take myself seriously. I am sure that many times I will play the fool--either intentionally or unintentionally."

Some of his self portraits are very inspiring, such as the one below. He has quite an extensive photo stream, including festivals in San Francisco, nude beaches, landscape, etc etc.



Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/fannybunda/

Infinite - by Alonso Arias Vanegas

Sculpture in Medellin by Alonso Arias Vanegas (of whom I have not been able to find any information)

I used to stare at this sculpture with curiosity back in the 70's, when I was in kindergarten and my school bus drove by that street. A couple of years ago I had to make a point of walking by and taking a couple of pictures of it. This, however, is not the photo I took. I grabbed this one from http://medellinrevista.blogspot.com/

William Wegman: Flo Day - Lift Off

As we watch the last launch of a space shuttle, William Wegman posted this wonderful image on his blog:



http://wegmanworld.typepad.com/wegman_world/2011/07/flo-day-lift-off.html

Casey Anthony Plain Nude Pancakes Art Auction by Dan Lacey

As Florida and the country got obsessed with the trial of Casey Anthony, Dan Lacey, the Painter of Pancakes, graces us with a series of paintings of Casey Anthony with pancakes, duct tape, etc. This and other Casey Anthony paintings are currently listed on eBay, just visit Dan Lacey's blog to see more.



http://faithmouse.blogspot.com/2011/07/casey-anthony-plain-nude-pancakes-art.html

Rik Garrett - Photography and Magic Together

I've been following Rik Garrett on blogspot and livejournal for a while. What first caught my attention was his use of traditional techniques, like wet plate photography. In our time of digital photography and photoshop, finding artists that take the time to work with real materials is always a treat.

But beyond that, Rik was expressing something more primal with his work. His dedication to create books that were allegorical to Alchemy and Magic, whether a spiritual quest or a metaphor for the photographic process and the artistic creation, is very thought provoking.

From his Earth Magic series:



More recently, Rik created a hand made book called Symbiosis, in a limited edition. The images were created by painting with acrylic paints over original photographs. This is one of the images from the Symbiosis series:



Website: http://www.rikgarrett.com/

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/rikgarrettphotography

Blogspot: http://rikgarrett.blogspot.com

Liu Bolin - Human Chamaleon

Amazing creativity and artistry that never fails to surprise. Take a look.

You can see a solo exhibition of Bolin's work at the Eli Klein Fine Art Gallery in New York Jun 29 – Aug. 28, 2011.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/liu-bolin-photos-nyc-2011-6?op=1#ixzz1QgqjjTbu



Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Liu-Bolin/109662852393125

Human Installation I "Gender Obsolescence" Performance art by Kyrahm + Julius Kaiser

Human Installation I "Gender Obsolescence" Performance art by Kyrahm + Julius Kaiser from KYRAHM on Vimeo.

Raphael Perez - Gay Paintings

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Steven Tynan - A photographer of self nudes

A few years ago the gentleman running the selfportrait gallery blog (which is still up, but has not been updated in a long time now) learned about some of my selfportraits and asked if I would donate one to his gallery. During our interaction he said that some of my work reminded him of Steven Tynan.

Not knowing who Steven Tynan was, I obviously ran a search and found his website. Steven is a professor of photography with an extense body of work in nude selfportraits.



Steven poses in the nude in several indoor and outdoor locations, in what would look like a house or farm. Sometimes he is only partially clothed, as if he was a child in the act of being mischievius. Sometimes he's riding a tricycle, or laying down on the field, or playing with toys (a ball, a dinosaur), working out or dancing. In a few photos he is actually urinating against a wall or in the grass, or even holding his penis, not unlike a baby that finds his penis and just holds it with curiosity. In some of the photos there is a dog or some cows.



His expression is often dry, emotionless, as if he was silently questioning the camera or the beholder. Steven is what you would consider an average looking man, not a supermodel type of person. Bulky, with rough expressions, mid aged. He never tries to look sexy or desirable in the photos. He just happens to be there, he just happens to not have clothes on, or to have his pants all the way down or things like that.



My appreciation of his work is that beyond the normal looking man, there is a child who once was told that it was not appropriate to walk naked outside the house or in front of his peers, and in being told so he was "stripped" from his nudity, stripped from his "innocence". He learned that he had to dress, like Adam and Eve did when expelled from the Garden of Eden. But once the child is no longer a child, once he becomes a proper adult, there is a rebellion, a longing to claim that right that he once had to not care, to be innocent, to walk naked here or there just for the hell of it, and so he tries to claim that right, that feeling once again, and in doing so, he questions the camera and the beholder with his eyes, which seem to be asking: "is this alright? does it matter that I'm naked?"

Some of his photos seem a bit more disturbing. In some of them there is an expression that I can't quite read. Is it anger, pain, or orgasm? Is he rebelling or punishing himself? His muscles are tense, his eyes closed, his face and neck distressed. I lean to believe it is the pain of shedding the social conditioning, it's anger at the loss of innocence. There's nothing else in his work that could suggest sexuality, so I find it hard to think that this expression could be of sexuality, but I'm reminded that as in Queen's song, "pain is so close to pleasure".



Finally, one last element of disturbance, at least from the point of view of our social conditioning, is the presence of a child in some of the photos. I would assume it's his son. The child is usually aside, clothed and unconcerned about the actions of the man. There's nothing inappropriate going on, as long as we assume that there is nothing wrong with a child witnessing the non-sexual nudity of a parent.

In a way, the presence of that child speaks of internal loneliness. Perhaps the only person who has no problem accepting the nudity of the adult (who was once a child) is the child (and perhaps the dog as well), the only one who doesn't see any mistery or any wrong connotation of shame or vulgarity into his actions. Perhaps that child is there to remind us of that innocence, that both the artist and we, the spectators, forgot a long time ago, when we learned that being naked was shameful and that we had to conceal our bodies behind fabric to be allowed in society.

Website: http://www.steventynan.co.uk/page1.html

Urbanudismo - Paula Brindisi

Urbanudismo started a few years ago when the Argentinian model Avril X (Paula Brindisi) decided to see what would happen if she was to cross a centric avenue. Nude.



Of course there were all kinds of reactions, which were promptly recorded in video, and the action itself was documented through video and photography.



As she wrote on her (no longer active) website, and her (currently active) blog:

"Me despierto recordando el repetido sueño en el que, sin saberlo, salgo desnuda o semi desnuda fuera de casa..." (I wake up remembering the repeated dream in which, unknowingly, I leave home nude or seminude...)

Was this performance art or gratuitous nudity? A short cut to fame or an ethic debate?

Several such "performances" followed in several countries, by Paula and by others who joined her "urbanudismo". Once again her words:

"Busco y encuentro quienes hacen realidad este sueño, se destapan junto a mí y capturan esos momentos y las reacciones que en la gente genera el hecho de ver a alguien haciendo lo mismo, pero sin taparse. Como todos por la ciudad, pero desnudos..." (I seek and I find those who make this dream reality, they bare next to me and they capture those moments and the reactions of people seeing somebody doing the same, but uncovered. Like everyone else in the city, but naked.)



According to the blog, Paula is currently in the process of publishing a book with photos that document the years of Urbanudismo.

As someone who dealt a lot with self-image issues, I really enjoyed seeing Urbanudism develop and evolve. People take for granted our clothes-based society and quite often ignore or forget where we came from, what we are. Nudity makes everyone equal, but put one nude person in a crowd and everyone will turn and stare, disgusted or enjoying but they will look. And that's what makes this kind of performance art relevant. Take the body out of the museum, out the bedroom, out of the shower and out of the doctor's office, lay it there in the middle of the street, under the sun. Most people will ask "why?", but there are some of us who will just say "why not?". If there's anything shocking about what we are, shouldn't we examine ourselves and start embracing the totality of ourselves?

Okay, too much ethics, too much philosophy or psychology. I hope you enjoyed this and all the other entries of my blog.

Urbanudismo in Blogger: http://urbanudismo.blogspot.com

William Wegman

I first heard about William Wegman in a Polaroid forum, where they referred to him as the artist that took Polaroid photos of Weimaraner dogs. Such a statement would be an over simplification of a complex and deep artist.



I went to his website. After a short visit all I knew was that I wanted to buy something from his store, I wasn't sure what but I loved everything that I was seeing.

Let me start by the medium. Yes he was shooting polaroid photos, but not your regular polaroid that you could (at that time) get film for at your corner pharmacy. No, William was using one of the few Polaroid 20x24 cameras, an impressive creation from 1978 that shoots photos on 20x24 inch instant film. This camera has been used by such diverse artists as Andy Warhol, Spencer Tunick, Lady Gaga and many many others. The camera per se is a very impressive object... and to this day, it remains in use in select locations such as the 20x24 studio in New York - see links at the end of the entry.


Photo taken from http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2010/0913/life-art-photography-cameras-polaroid-land-grab.html


Then, the photos themselves, were far from simple photos of pets. William Wegman has been experimenting with his dogs as models/muses from the late 70s, and his dogs have become experienced and willing models in the creative process. Let's let a couple of photos from his books speak for themselves.






For those who had the pleasure of growing up watching Sesame Street, these dogs might look a bit familiar. William Wegman has also created films, including several segments for Sesame Street.



I have in my collection two of his books.

Polaroids





and

Fashion Photographs



How could I resist them? I've been to an exhibit of some of his polaroids at a local museum. It was a great time.

Website: http://www.wegmanworld.com/

Online store: http://www.wegmanstore.com/

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/WilliamWegman?ref=ts&sk=wall

Tumblr: http://williamwegman.tumblr.com/


Also, as reference, the 20x24 studio on

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/20x24-Studio/126024313416?sk=wall

Website: http://20x24studio.com/

Dan Lacey, the Painter of Pancakes

I first heard of Dan Lacey when he posted some of his art to the wft_art community in LiveJournal. It was certainly fitting artwork: nude Obama and Penelope the unicorn? Pancakes?


Obama Unicorn / Oddysey Dawn

Yeah, art can have humor and strange obsessions. Looking at Dan Lacey's work I see both things, humor and obsessions. Celebrities (with pancakes). No more pancakes for Osama Bin Laden. Political statements. Symbols. Eroticism. I can say I'm becoming a fan and look forward to each new post, whether in LJ, blogspot or facebook, and upcoming auctions on eBay.

My personal favorite so far has been a portrait of a nude man looking for a cat under the bed.


Male nude on bed looking for cat

Website: http://www.faithmouse.com/

Blogger: http://faithmouse.blogspot.com

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Dan-Lacey/109095222452474