Naked Ladies

So, I read the lovely Art Journal Essay "the MOMA's hot Mommas" by Carol Duncan through twice, and realized what I am going to take away from Graduate school- a gratefulness for not having to discuss art in New York City in the 1980's. I am not going to remember any salient details from these articles- they slip though my mind like sand through the hour glass. I'm writing pages of notes, which I reread and remember just this vague sense on annoyance without substance.

The article discusses the rearrangement of the MoMA circa 1984, focusing specifically on Demoiselles de Avignon by Mr. Picasso and Mr. DeKooning's "Woman 1" (described as the "fus(ion of the) terrible killer-witch with the willing and exhibitionist Whore.") I do agree with Ms. Duncan that "the MOMA remains enormously important for the role it plays in maintaining in the present a particular version of the art historical past." However, since I have never been to the MOMA, and since it no longer exists on it's former floor plan, and has greatly expanded it's collections since this article was written, I don't actually understand the relevancy of the article to my current place and time as a creator or observer. Also, the article tries to discuss femininity in a way I found as outdated as the description of the layout.


My high school art teacher was obsessed with breasts. She was very fond of Mr. DeKooning, and frequently showed us slides of the "Woman" series. I thought at the time that they were clumsy, tedious, bosomy for the sake of being bosomy, inarticulate paintings. But wanting to do well in the class, and following in the many derivative footsteps of other highschool students before me, I dutifully drew women with very large, pronounced breasts, ugly, angry faces, and little, or no, legs. At the time they undoubtedly resembled myself- I was a top-heavy angry person through most of my young adulthood. Maybe because I so thoroughly embraced this character the paintings of DeKooning have never seemed particularly threatening to me. Women are angry and clumsy creatures occasionally, just as men are impotent warmongerers. No big deal- we all have many facets to our personalities, and may we be able to explore them all through art.

Ms. Duncan seemed particularly interested in the gorgon-likeness of the women in the "Woman" series. I have always found that I feel like I more resemble a gorgon than a nymph, and haven't never felt that the depiction of women, by men or women, as such, was threatening to my girly-ness. Women have these capacities, and they have been celebrated through millenia in many forms- from Kali to Medusa. We wouldn't, as a society, choose to remember them if they weren't important, dear to us.

The article concludes with a passage comparing an image from the COVER of Penthouse, advertised on city streets (and "available everywhere") with the pieces in the museum. In it Ms. Duncan describes porn as "images designed... to stimulate desire, primarily in men." The image from the cover is of a woman, seated much like the full frontal seated women of the "Woman" series, fully clad, and not even showing cleavage. Growing up as I have, seeing porn as not limited to stimulating desire specifically in either gender, I also find no offense in the Penthouse cover. Call it DeKooning for the masses, if you will. But I wonder what Ms. Duncan makes of images made by woman in the mainstream now.

Specifically I'm thinking of the Beyone Run The World(Girls) perfomance on at the Billboard awards 2011, and also of the original video. Both depict not only scantilly clad, gyrating women, but are clearly made not only to stimulate desire, sexual and otherwise in both genders, but to intimidate the fuck out of people. The original music video depicts riot cops and exploding cars, Beyonce on a cross, and a woman possibly masterbating in a cage. And is that Lady Gaga walking those hyenas, the symbol of female dominated society? (I don't know, because I don't participate with pop culture frequently) The lyrics are the oddest of all, though I find them strangely empowering, if sorta infantile...
(I'm repping for the girls who taking over the world
Have me raise a glass for the college grads
Anyone rolling I'll let you know what time it is
You can't hold me
I broke my 9 to 5 and copped my cheque
This goes out to all the women getting it in,
Get on your grind
To the other men that respect what I do
Please accept my shine
Boy you know you love it
How we're smart enough to make these millions
Strong enough to bare the children
Then get back to business
See, you better not play me
Don't come here baby
Hope you still like me)

The vidoe and performance depict probably angry women in formation, taking on a mythical male army. But watching both I'm amazed by how much I am supposed to assume that there is a revolution needed, or that somehow men are somehow afraid of, or in-equal to women. I don't think I want girls, especially these girls, to run the world. They seem incapable of re-assesing and recreating a new and better place, and more just bent on destruction using tanks and glitter. Ah well, we can't win 'em all.

hope you still like me, too.