From: Sarah Van Keuren (svk@steuber.com)
Date: 09/15/00-01:23:39 PM Z
Thought I'd weigh in here. I came of age in the 50's and as a tall thin
'drink of water' was totally out of synch with the feminine ideal. Now in my
own 50's it is a relief to begin to become an eccentric older woman, a
person rather than a not-quite-chick.
I drew and painted from nudes, male and female, in past decades and in
recent decades have photographed nudes of both genders. But lately I have
stopped making pinhole exposures of nudes. It occurs to me, reading this
great exchange of opinions, that the idea of nude as subject/object isolated
from setting is intrinsically bankrupt. It has been co-opted and
contaminated for venal and political purposes, much as the pictorial
landscape was 'hallmarkized'.
Recently I have come to recognize that for an image to move me there needs
to be an underlying abstract structure that reinforces the literal content.
And I require that the overt subject matter undergo or be capable of some
sort of metaphoric transformation. I keep thinking of Bonnard's paintings of
his wife at her bath and how embedded her figure is within a patterned
atmospheric setting, how absorbed she is in stepping out of the tub or
drying herself. Doubtless this citing will elicit speculation regarding how
Bonnard's wife felt about being thus depicted and I wonder too but I can't
help thinking of those paintings. She inhabits her own domestic space and is
a part of a larger figuration.
In my own images I care about the face or figure as part of the landscape if
the human form is present at all. But as time goes by I find that I
sublimate my libido and love of the figure into landscape or symbol. There
is too much unwanted baggage dragging at the nude. I find a garden sexier as
subject matter.
Sarah
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