"There's an element of sexuality in all portraiture"

[aplumpton]

<p>Re your last sentence, I agree, and I didn't mean to demean Lex's experience with the photo of the artist. I agree also that It is a great experience to be touched by a portrait or photograph in emotional, sexual or other manner. The magic of the image, as I think you said. </p>

[charleswood]

<p>I think that Avedon makes, in his first quote from Julie, an analogy that isn't a very productive in explaining his creative inspirations/motivations. He was trying in that quote to <em>be</em> 'sexy' and he and his idea are thus by device made inordinately attractive.</p>

<p>Perhaps the same can be said of his style of photography? Maybe not. His contemporaneous ramblings on himself, generalized to his artistic medium: why should he be able to explain himself with more or less clarity than anyone else, why should he have any more understanding of creativity than we do?</p>

<p>Avedon could with legitimacy say "My portraiture is about this, or that", but he takes, as Fred suggested, the path of a philosopher by opining that "portraiture is about this or that".</p>

<p> </p>

[charleswood]

<p>What Avedon did seem to have, though he found himself at pain to explain it, from an early age an ability to detach and examine that was paradoxical in that in allowed him to capture intensity, something that attracted him in a heightened way and allowed him to intensely connect with his subjects, I'm guessing.</p>

<p>Avedon says: "I'm not making myself clear. Do you understand?" Why should he be able to make himself clear? He probably understood as little as we do or can understand, why he or we was/were/are compelled to be creative in the way that he was or in the ways we are.</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Charles, I generally find the little gems artists utter of greater interest than their more lengthy endeavors at figuring out what the heck they're doing and why. Picasso, Warhol capture something significant in some of their well-known but pithy quotes. But it's because of the suggestiveness in what they say, not unlike the great Yogi Berra-isms.</p>

<p>Some more in-depth explanations are of great value. Weston's <em>Daybooks</em>, Tzara's <em>Manifesto</em>.</p>

<p>Artists may, indeed, be worse at explaining things than others which is why they've chosen their various mediums with which to express themselves, often non-verbally. We also have to account for the all-important aspect of self-promotion. In this case, some of what Avedon is up to can be summed up in the adage we all know and love . . . sex sells.</p>

<p>Now, I'm not so cynical as to think Avedon might not also have believed in what he was saying about portraiture. But I agree with you in just seeing at as one man's musings.</p>

<p>"Portraits", IMO, is not a monolithic unit and can't all be explained using the same grammar or vocabulary. Nineteenth-century philosophers from Nietzsche to John Stuart Mill to Wittgenstein flirted with the concept of family resemblances. Family resemblance suggests that things like portraits are connected by overlapping similarities rather than one essential feature common to all. In this case, I don't think Avedon is really defining portraits by sexuality but I think his theory would benefit from consideration of not looking for all portraits to act the same way or possess the same element. Conveniently, the notion of family resemblance, which was meant to counter the more essentially-oriented Platonic Idea or Form, seems almost tailor made, if only in name, for an application to portraiture.</p>

<p>Julie hinted at something else of interest, which is just where Avedon or any of us would draw the line of portraiture from, say, photos with people in them. Since "portrait" itself is a matter of blurred lines it becomes harder to then talk about another descriptive quality that would not necessarily define portraiture but that all portraits would have.</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>There are a few people I've photographed where I'd give most of the credit for certain aspects or qualities of the photo to the subject. With most folks, it's a collaboration.</p>

<p>Sexuality can be one of those qualities where the subject could get a lot of the credit.</p>

<p>This Brodsky photo of <a href="https://www.morrisonhotelgallery.com/images/medium/brodsky%20younglion.jpg">JIM MORRISON</a> is such a case, I think.</p>

<p>There are some people who are going to exude sexuality almost regardless of the circumstance. It is just there. And some of those people will conjugate so well with the camera that the photos will hardly be able to miss being sexual.</p>

<p>Of course, this is but one way a portrait can be sexual.</p>

<p>Then there's this guy, or I should say, this photo of this guy, <a href="http://www.biography.com/imported/images/Biography/Images/Profiles/G/Hugh-Grant-9318171-1-402.jpg">HUGH GRANT</a>. We now know probably way too much of Hugh's sexuality. His being male and our knowledge of his history, I suppose, are sexual matters. And he's not an unattractive man to me. Yet, I am comfortable saying that this portrait is not sexual. Sorry, don't know who the photographer is.</p>

<p> </p>

[charleswood]

<p>Avedon was presumably speaking during our so called sexual revolution, and was perhaps being provocatively prescriptive when offering that he thought "A confrontational, erotic quality, I think, should underline all portraiture." How narrowly or broadly construe the word 'erotic' is an open question.</p>

<p>To me the letter to his father was tantalizingly brief.</p>

<p>If portraiture is of people then I don't see why we wouldn't size up a picture the same way we respond with yea or nay when meeting someone in person, given we are in good health and not in a bad mood.</p>

<p>Fred and anyone else, maybe the question is how do you decide to play up or play down sexuality in portraiture? And is it always up to you? Probably not. Fred has already said as much. My example, in this one from me I didn't realize she had a crush on me at the time and was 'boosting' her profile: <a href="/photo/12049972">http://www.photo.net/photo/12049972</a></p>

<p>As to sexuality in general, I've got a friend, well, former friend now as it would be awkward to do any 'couple' things with his wife and him now that they have become part of some swinging scene. The thing is, the illusion is powerful where the husband is motivated as is typical, but I suspect the wife is looking for someone else to instead be in a permanent relationship with. I doubt those complexities were what Avedon had in mind when saying all portraiture should have a confrontational erotic quality. He is a man after all, and eroticism? Erotic to whom?</p>

[lex_jenkins]

<p>I'm not too concerned about applying a conventional definition of "sexuality" to what Avedon meant by his use of the term. As Laura Wilson noted in <a href="http://aphelis.net/avedons-instructions/">recalling Avedon's instructions</a> for printing photos for the <em>In the American West</em> project, he was inclined to describe how he wanted the prints done in imprecise or non-technical terms of emotional or visceral impact rather than in terms of exposure, contrast, etc.</p>

<p>When I finally got to see the <em>American West</em> exhibit in 2005 when it reprised at the Amon Carter here in Fort Worth, I was impressed by the human energy conveyed by those portraits. None of the familiar pejorative critiques I'd heard and read seemed to suit these photos. Many of them seemed like people I knew and had met. The portraits may not have been conventionally flattering but they weren't any of the negative things I'd heard either. Some had a visceral energy that could indeed be described as sexual in the broadest sense of the term as a single word attempt to describe vital energy, physical presence and apparent charisma. In particular the photo of <a href="http://www.richardavedon.com/index.php#mi=2&pt=1&pi=10000&s=18&p=7&a=0&at=0">Juan Patricio Lobato</a> seemed to radiate that energy - the thin, sinewy, serpentine pose of a character who seemed drawn from William S. Burroughs' feverish fantasies of the denizens of the Interzone.</p>

<p>The problem with dwelling too much on the word "sexuality" is that it tends to emphasize a physical act that takes up a tiny fraction of 1% of our lives, while neglecting the energy, tension and enormous investment of imagination and fantasy that goes into making that tiny fraction of a percent seem so much larger than it really is. In that sense words like sexy and sexuality are like smoke, a word which itself conjures multiple allusions.</p>

[Julie H]

<p>Lex wrote: "takes up a tiny fraction of 1% of our lives."</p>

<p>Okay. Lets talk competitiveness -- the sizing up and down of one's fellows; and the urge to excel; and genesis; and creation, in an asexual manner. Gosh, I just don't know <em>what</em> made me do it!</p>

<p>All those territorial, posturing, sniffing, fighting, and fornicating animals; we're not like <em>that</em>.</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p><em>"Fred and anyone else, maybe the question is how do you decide to play up or play down sexuality in portraiture? And is it always up to you? Probably not."</em></p>

<p>I tend to be on the lookout for it. In some cases, the way to play it up is to play it down. Sometimes, all I have to do is ask a guy to take his shirt off. </p>

<p>In the two photos below, their projections of sexuality (or lack thereof) were mostly (maybe all) up to them. I found them the stage and scenery but didn't give them the lines or direct the attitudes (though I suppose I captured them). As I see it, in order to work, each needed the very different photos they're a part of. These guys couldn't be interchanged in the two photos. Or could they? As a matter of fact, in the first one, the color one, I do remember thoughts in the back of my head about how a traditional boudoir shot might be done with a woman. I doubt I would have bothered to do that shot with a woman, though.</p>

<p><a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/6436819-lg.jpg">NUDE WITH MIRROR</a></p>

<p><a href="http://d6d2h4gfvy8t8.cloudfront.net/11680731-lg.jpg">DANNY</a></p>

[aplumpton]

<p>Sexual is in the nature of the subject matter or what it represnts. Sexuality is the interaction of the photograph with the mind of the viewer. Not all portraiture exhibits or invokes the latter. There are only limited constants or commonalities in nature and the word "all" does not reflect that.</p>

[GerrySiegel]

<p>I will restate my feelings toward portrait subjects. It is something which the word love righltly defines its quality for me, and I can speak only for me. Love, powerful word, is more all encompassing than mere sexual attraction and more of a giving than a taking relationship. I will envelop and embrace visually my subject and give it my personal touch in a pseudo physical way. We can go from abstraction to higher abstraction and get lost quickly. I think Avedon knew that portraits are a powerful part of human interaction. It gets high on Mazlow's need hierarchy. Babies need touch but visual sighting of the human face. It is part of mammalian genetic inheritance.</p>

[Julie H]

<p>Gerry, this thread is supposed to be about <strong><em>sexuality</em></strong>, not (just) that element of sexuality that is "sexual attraction." I think one could easily argue that sexuality is "more all encompassing" than love. I could also very easily argue that sexual attraction is "more all encompassing" than many kinds of love. Sexuality is always present. It's not something detachable that can be left at the door. Love may or may not be there. In a portrait session, you may well love picturing, but not the thing pictured -- and that "thing" may very well not love you.</p>

<p>Why is sexuality not love-able? Why isn't it one of the most lovable things about a person, any person? Why would a castrated or neutered or asexual person be more about or expressive of love?</p>

<p>Higher and "higher abstraction" is exactly what sexuality is *not* about. It's breasts, buttocks, lips, beards ... skin, skin, skin ... and every nuance of body language and the motivation of every nuance of body language ... (I have a terrible memory for faces, but I can *always* tell you whether or not I found someone "attractive." Can't remember the first thing about color or form, but I can sure tell you about their sexuality -- without being able to explain it.)</p>

<p>Further, "love" is complicated. Most violence in this country is domestic, and most domestic violence is at least in part to do with love.</p>

<p>******</p>

<p>As illustration, again, using Avedon on his pictures of his dying father. This is transcript from the video, <em>Richard Avedon: Darkness and Light</em>, starting with Avedon on-camera, talking about his father:</p>

<p>.</p>

<blockquote>

<p>"[They were] ... my way of trying to reach him, trying to get him to know who I was because everything about the two of us was on <em>his</em> terms. I went into "business" with him ...</p>

<p>"I loved him but we never spoke the same language ... "</p>

<p>>>>> [<em>cut to Avedon's son John speaking</em>]</p>

<p>"... through his entire life he [Jacob Israel, his grandfather] was only able to discuss emotion through discussion of money, material objects ...</p>

<p>>>>> [<em>back to Avedon, talking about the letter he sent his father because his father hated the pictures -- see previous comment, above</em>]</p>

<p>"I've got to write to him so he can't dismiss it or not hear it.</p>

<p>"I don't know what those photographs mean. I was in analysis at the time -- on and off -- and, it occurred to me, <em>years</em> later, that maybe photographing him <em>was</em> an act of hostility, shooting, killing with my camera, ... I said to the analyst, could it possibly be that I was telling myself that this was about love and connection and it really was a kind of murder, and he said, yes, of course, and I said, you're an analyst, why didn't you tell me???!! isn't that your job? and he said, I never interfere with the creative process unless damage is being done. <em>No</em> damage was being done, and fine photography was the result."</p>

<p>>>>> [<em>again, camera cuts to Avedon's son John, talking</em>]</p>

<p>"When I saw the photographs I was upset by them. Because I thought it was an invasion of privacy ... and ... uh ... that ... of course, is the very essence of being a photographer. It's an invasive, in many ways, art form.</p>

<p>>>>> [<em>cut back to Avedon, talking, sounding a little defensive</em>]</p>

<p>"It's just strange, to me, that anyone would ever think that a work of art <em>shouldn't</em> be disturbing or <em>shouldn't</em> be invasive: that's the property of a work of art! that's the arena of a work of art: it's to disturb, it's to make you think, it's to make you feel. ...</p>

<p>"If my work didn't disturb from time to time, it would be a failure in my own eyes. It's meant to disturb ... in a positive way."</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Gerry wrote: "It is part of mammalian genetic inheritance." The urgency of "inheritance," especially genetic inheritance, is not about sexuality?</p>

<p> </p>

[anirbanbanerjee]

<p>Really? To the OP: what about portraiture of pre-pubescent children?</p>

[Julie H]

<p>How do you know they are "pre-pubescent"? To what did you look to reach that identification?</p>

<p>Are children asexual? (If you ask <em>them</em>, I know what they'll say.)</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>It seems to me we're witnessing the result of trying to claim that all portraiture has X . . . or, now, Y.</p>

<p>[sarcasm]I got one! All portraiture is about "beauty." No, I mean all ART is about beauty.[/sarcasm] These singular words seem to suggest a hope of finding the "God of portraiture." We do love an essential omnipresence. And omnipotence, which seems very apt when talking about sexuality.</p>

<p>We try to draw a definable ring around portraiture to better understand it. We try to grasp it by constricting it. We being the debaters, not the portraitists.</p>

<p>This is all very <em>not</em> visual. What Avedon said SOUNDS pretty good. I doubt he meant it in the way it's being discussed here. I wish we could ask him if he meant it as a philosophical treatise. IMO, it was simply what he was feeling at the moment. Hmmm, a moment in time, not unlike a photo.</p>

[lex_jenkins]

<p>I'm inclined to agree, Fred. When I listen to Avedon talking about photography, and read Laura Wilson's anecdotes about working with him, it seems pretty clear that he spoke in terms of the impressions of a visual artist rather than in the specifics of a philosopher or linguist.</p>

<p>So, again, I'm inclined to regard his use of the terms "sexuality" and "erotic" in conjunction with "confrontational" rather loosely as a shorthand for that essential human energy, vitality and charisma that, often inexplicably, draws us toward certain people, even if we are simultaneously held at arm's length or even repulsed. He may indeed have been thinking in terms of conventional sexual appeal in reference to some of his favorite subjects, such as Audrey Hepburn. And he may have been thinking in terms of indefinable personal magnetism in reference to other subjects.</p>

<p>An example might be the odd obsession model Nell Theobald developed after being mauled by a lion in 1966. I'm not sure anyone has ever developed a fully realized theory for why Theobald - a lovely young woman - developed a stalker's obsession for soprano Birgit Nilsson, who was much older than Theobald and generously described as rather lumpy, dowdy and not sexy in any conventional sense.</p>

<p>Avedon's portraits of his aging father do not depict a conventionally attractive man. But the elder Avedon does appear as a powerful, if fading, figure of intimidating patriarchal proportions. And the Avedon family's varying reactions to those portraits recalls the biblical account of Ham somehow shaming an incapacitated Noah, along with the quirkier speculations and implications related to that tale. Avedon's portraits of his father are certainly confrontational. But any sexuality or eroticism is likely to have been limited to the sense of the Ham and Noah confrontation, a sort of indirect emasculating.</p>

[charleswood]

<p>Avedon from above "I said to the analyst, could it possibly be that I was telling myself that this was about love and connection and it really was a kind of murder, and he said, yes, of course, and I said, you're an analyst, why didn't you tell me???!! isn't that your job?" and he said, I never interfere with the creative process unless damage is being done."</p>

<p>The analyst could have replied to the question "Isn't that your job?" by saying "No, that isn't my job. My job isn't to explain you to yourself." And to Avedon's question about if in his act of photographing his vulnerable father he, with his camera, wasn't connecting with his father, but was instead being hostile to his father, figuratively shooting and killing him: the analyst said "Of course." The analyst could have said instead "What do you think your motives were, Richard?" Answering "Of course" was the analyst accepting the role of "one who understands". The analyst saying to Richard's anger "I never interfere..." was the analyst's pretense of a wise and elevated viewpoint, a view from the position of having a greater understanding of events that he either chooses to intervene or chooses to not intervene, from the vantage point of wisdom. The analyst offered to Richard no more than any other, just a load of positional posturing, at least in the brief view we have of those two from those quoted writings.</p>

<p>Which is to say that the analyst was accepting of Richard as a confused dependent who needed the superior judgment of the analyst to resolve Richard's questions of motive, etc. Which is to say that the analyst was accepting of himself as a holder of wisdom and clarity, the holder of simple "Of course" answers. For the analyst, it was nice to be regarded as a person who 'knows better', but the analyst is confused about his own motives, so it is between the analyst and Richard a case of the blind leading the blind.</p>

<p>It feels sad to me to see Richard struggling with the fact of an emotionally inadequate father and not being able to just accept that, to mourn thoroughly what one never had from but still needed from a parent, and to then let it go.</p>

<p>I watched two coyote parents raise each year's offspring from instinct. From instinct they gave to their coyote children everything, <em>everything</em> those pups needed to survive in a world that is both kind and cruel. Another observer has recorded a coyote parent 'planting' dead voles in dirt and later bringing the pups to that site to 'discover' and dig up that food. I say instinct, but have to acknowledge that coyote youngsters stick around for a couple years and learn from successive litters the ins and outs of instinctive parenting. I suppose in their culture too, things can break down and not work, replication errors, but I think instincts are innate and though their expression can be injured, the instinct is not injured, is created ever new in each moment and in each generation. Sexuality doesn't exist in a loveless vacuum, never exists as something separate from all the other aspects of our life, both the highest and the lowest. This you can prove to yourself by observation.</p>

<p> </p>

[anirbanbanerjee]

<blockquote>

<p ><a href="/photodb/user?user_id=3885114">Julie H</a><a href="/member-status-icons"><img title="Subscriber" src="/v3graphics/member-status-icons/sub7.gif" alt="" /><img title="Current POW Recipient" src="/v3graphics/member-status-icons/trophy.gif" alt="" /></a>, Nov 07, 2013; 06:32 a.m.</p>

 

<p>How do you know they are "pre-pubescent"? To what did you look to reach that identification?<br>

Are children asexual? (If you ask <em>them</em>, I know what they'll say.)</p>

 

</blockquote>

 

<p>Well, human height <em>is</em> an indication, among other things :-)</p>

<p>I agree that there is an amount of sexual attention that comes into play when a human being views another -- it's a result of millions of years of evolution -- however, why should this apply to portrait photography, and esp. children'ss portraits? </p>

 

[iliafarniev]

<p>"... tell me???!! isn't that your job?" and he said, I never interfere ... "</p>

<p>Well, that's the edited version made for mainstream release. In reality it went like this:<br />"... why don't you tell me?" -- "Aren't you know already? -- "Sure do, yousmarta*" and then they loughed at each other cordially and went on minding their own business.</p>

<p>Besides, the reason for the interview has to be considered. Because then Avedon was taking picture of Bill Casby he realised this was actually a selfportrait and than curators smelled it they figured this has to be the insrument for a much antisipated slow-go and they needed to buy some time. And Richard figured he might be the one responsible for the scars on Andys belly, which in a way he was but felt half-proud-half-unsuttisfied for a moment and assistent said she had to reload giving them a moment for reflecting right back on the source.</p>

<p>So, folks, there naturally was no love at all and they were way to old for anything but remember you have to sell product and stuff and so it goes ... something like Ellis sayd, pretty well known stuff put in steady works since Great Depression Movie Boom in Holywood not to mention its French and German roots back home.</p>

[GerrySiegel]

<p>Couple final thoughts spring to mind in the definition business. Assigning words like sexuality to imagery in the arts broadly speaking .<br /> - Johnny Holmes, one of the once big porn actors said in a Playboy interview, "I scoff at those who claim they (copulate with) <em>personality.</em> "I (copulate with )(breasts, buttocks and genitals.) "Phooey on <em>personality. That is baloney!</em> " ....free translation of Johnny. Wadd for this forum...<br /> To which a lady friend retorted, " Johnny Wadd is so wrong: lots of women (copulate with) '<em>personality."</em> So slow down and leave us not take a too shallow view of sexual attraction is all I must add even when sexual attraction is latent or even integral to our intense soulful nature as arteestes. <br /> So. What did Avedon think as he did a head shot of Brigitte Bardot in my Taschen photo book? Could he separate his sexual fantasies about the sex kitten from his technical objectivity to portray her for the public consumption? (Who knows, too late to ask but I presume he was a well rounded male with an artistic temperament not unlike most of us here....<br /> As to his shot of a strapping man holding a child over his head in the surf, I have trouble seeing that in sexual terms period. Would never enter my mind to look at the body part of the child or wonder about why one was naked.<br /> My family doctor once said "Gerry,you know I love all my patients. " I understood him perfectly. A doctor after 10 years may well learn to <em>love</em> his patients, beyond their rashes and sniffles. And he sees enough to know what we look like with our skirts down.....<br>

But hey, likely, I feel pretty sure actually, I have missed most of the point of this lengthy exploration and can add nothing further to the subject. Ah well, back I go to the nudes folios. No ambiguity there :-)</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>I've always felt badly about (or at least found strange) what society and culture have done to us with regard to sexuality. As a gay man, I've never had any trouble seeing someone like Brigitte Bardot or Marilyn Monroe or, when I was a teenage boy, Jane Fonda in Barbarella, as sexual. Most of my gay friends say the same thing. We didn't want to go to bed with them, but that didn't stop us from experiencing them or their photos as sexual, certainly seeing them in sexual terms. Time and again, I hear straight guys offering disclaimers when they look at photos of nude men. "I'm not gay and I'm not turned on but I love this photo" is one of the most popular. We have done straight men a big disservice by not allowing them to recognize and even to feel the sexuality of a strapping young guy extremely well photographed on the beach. So many heterosexual men have been rendered so sexually helpless or impotent that they cannot see another man in sexual terms. By contributing to that, our oppressive and somewhat adolescent culture has seen to it that just a little bit of the joy of looking at another person and a photo cannot be experienced.</p>

[Norma Desmond]

<p>Man with child, how could that be sexual? If not a turn-on, perhaps because it suggests progeny.</p>