My Very 1st KCAI Term Paper

December 2, 2010 at 4:44 am | Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments
Tags: "The Exhibition of Sexual Passion and the Human Race", art gallery, Édouard-Henri Avril, black-figure painting, Bruno Gmünder, Circle Lydos, City of Paris Museum of Fine Arts, coffee table book, curator, curatorial proposal, De Figuris Veneris: A Manual of Classical Erotica, Drew Linne, Drew Matthew Francis Linne, erotic art, erotica, French, Friedrich Karl Forberg, gay, German, graphite, graphite on paper, Greek, Gustave Courbet, Japanese, Kansas City Art Institute, Katsushika Hokusai, Khalil Bey, krater, lesbian, love, oil painting, passion, Paul Avril, photography, photorealism, Players, Rick Day, Rick Day Photography, sex, term paper, The Chicago Cultural Center, The National Archaeological Museum of Spain, Tom of Finland, Touko Laaksonen, vessel painting, Western Thought 2, woodblock print

Wow, it sure has been a while since I did a blog entry. But the end of my first semester at the Kansas City Art Institute seems like a great reason to do a new one! Anyway, this is the final version of my term paper that I just turned in for my Western Thought 2 class. We had to choose a famous philosopher’s quote from a list she gave us, use it to develop a theme for an art exhibition, then choose six works of art to support my theme, and then explain how it all comes together and why I want to curate the show. I’ll post an update when I find out how well I did on it, but for now: I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

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The Exhibition of Sexual Passion

and the Human Race

A Curatorial Proposal by Drew Matthew Francis Linne

 

Throughout history the human race has been known for its passion, at the levels of both society as a whole and as individuals within everyday activities. Roland Barthes, a twentieth century philosopher, once said, “What the public wants is the image of passion, not passion itself.” Passion is the word used for an intense emotion, something we are all guilty of, and which can always take form in an infinite number of ways.  It is a feeling that is brought upon by a desire or love of something, whether it be a passion for something like carpentry or quantum physics, or the love of adventure or the gentle touch of another soul.

The love of a human being is perhaps the most valued and most powerful of all emotions, but is it really something that every person wants or is capable of feeling?  Roland Barthes suggests that is indeed the case.  Even if we are capable, it seems apparent that as the years pass we continue to rely more on the presence of pornography, written erotica as well as arousing works of art for bringing upon sexual pleasure rather than one’s own lover. The enjoyment, and even the production of pornography has been frowned upon by “civilized” society since its conception. Now, because pornography is so readily available at the touch of a finger through the wonder that is the internet, I think people often forget that nudity and sex were once considered to be important aspects of both religion and art.

Artists around the world have been producing erotic artwork for thousands of years to satisfy the sexual desires of the public. This image of passion as a form of art would even be commissioned by wealthy government figures; who, although probably unaware, occasionally were chosen as the subjects. The erotic art genre is not lost in the contemporary world, but it is constantly going underground, becoming something that one would have to search out if the want arose, and then resurfacing again some years later when the world is more tolerant. Only in the past five decades or so has the genre grown more prominent again. Whether society acknowledges it or not, this change is more important than it has ever been. Because of the rapidly progressing advancement of our technology and the ease of keeping certain parts of one’s life private, I am not so sure that the genre of erotic art will ever go underground again.

As of yet, it is unclear whether or not the uprising of erotica is a progression or a regression. Not one individual has the knowledge or the right to say so, either way. But our growing need for sexual release seems to be tearing some of us apart. To me, it is not that the public does not want passion. What the public does want is what they do not have already. That is why erotica is so seductive. It is so attainable and yet so out of reach at the same time. Society’s desire for this sexual release is so ever-present in the media nowadays, for instance, in advertising, television shows, reality TV, and movies, it would be nearly impossible to avoid or deny, even if we wanted to. There is an importance in thinking about this because it is all around us. And like it or not, it is here to stay.

To aid in the thought process on this issue, I have selected and organized a series of erotic art that is to be shown at the Chicago Cultural Center. The Cultural Center is the perfect place to have a show of this kind because it is a free venue and accessible to anyone and everyone who wants to see it. Furthermore, the show will run for the whole month of July 2011, because not only can it be visited by Chicago residents, but tourists visiting the city will want to see the Cultural Center because it is free and easy to get to since it is in the downtown area. When a visitor walks into the first floor gallery, the first thing they will come upon is an ancient Greek krater by the potter and painter, Circle Lydos. It was painted with the images of mythical satyrs displaying their large, erect penises, and must be displayed behind a glass case in order to protect it from damaging fingers. Straight ahead on the far wall is the next piece of artwork, an erotic Japanese woodblock print by Katsushika Hokusai, with the other four artworks mounted along the gallery wall in a clockwise direction. Next is an oil painting of two women in bed by Gustave Courbet; then an oil painting of two men, this time by Édouard-Henri Avril; a graphite drawing of gay lovers by the artist known as Tom of Finland; and finally, a photograph of a man taken by Rick Day. Each piece I have chosen has its own place in the history of erotic art, and will hopefully help us to learn about our own fascination with it. Continue Reading My Very 1st KCAI Term Paper…