Approaching Difficult Artwork

by K. Townsend (28 MAY, 2003)

I remember hearing a lecture a few years back entitled "Two Confessions Towards the Arts" by a former Zen-Buddhist monk named Ellis Potter, from a small town near Geneva (Switzerland). It stuck with me enough that I still recall it's content many years later, and need to come back to it as a challenge to fairness and honesty more often than I would like to admit. The heart of it was as follows:

1.) There is good art that I don't like. There are works of art in the world that are noble, honest, careful, meaningful, accurate, technically excellent, very expressive, and I may not like them at all, or even actively dislike them. They are objectively very fine works of art, but I don't understand the language, or it's from a different period of time, perspective or moral outlook than I'm familiar or comfortable with, or whatever it may be.

2.) Our 'taste' is not an accurate way of evaluating art. There are works of art that are sloppy, cheap, tawdry, saccharin, meaningless, irrelevant, and lazy, and they can be my favorite things in all the world. The question shouldn't be "how do I feel about it" - to answer that question is to tell the questioner something about myself, and not necessarily the film, painting, photograph, etc.

I seem to come back to these comments (assertions, really) again and again, because I want - at least I like to think I want - to be fair and honest to photographs, films and novels <insert your own obsessions here> that I find morally, aesthetically or intellectually difficult, without having to resign my own awkwardly earned convictions to the rubbish bin of moral oblivion (TM, patents pending). I genuinely believe this is a harder thing today than it has been in quite some time, whether measured in historical (aesthetic), cultural or philosophical terms. Whether this conflict is intentional (famously Mapplethorpe, Seranno, etc.), or unintentional (Jock Sturges, etc.), the difficulties (and natural reactions) are often the same: revulsion, wholesale rejection, and/or moral and intellectual disengagement, I think primarily because (humanly) we want to avoid the work and challenge to our identity of really thinking things through, or asking difficult, opaque questions about the validity of our instinctive reactions to something contrary to our own innate sensibilities. (Sounds complex, but a simply enough idea beneath the haze.)

The question I find myself wrestling with again and again then, is: Contrary to my instinctive disengagement with moral disparity, how do I approach something which, at least on the surface (and perhaps beneath the surface as well) is contrary to one or many of the beliefs I hold most essential to my outlook on life, i.e., genuinely listening to the other person, without losing or being obliged to sacrifice my own thoughts or ideals upon the altar of alleged impartiality? There's nothing easy in answering that, nor in trying to enact any meaningful (i.e., fair) answers you may acquire in the process. It's seems inescapable to me that meaningful interaction with artwork, though, is no different than meaningful interaction with people - it's easy within the framework of familiar and self-affirming opinion (i.e., variations of 'ourselves'); it's often incredibly frustrating, challenging, and even (handled improperly) isolating or destructive in the context or framework of well thought out and clearly articulated opinions contrary or inimical to our own.

I've learned a lot (for better and for worse) on how and how not to proceed with questions like this partly because of conversations (polemics in disguise, really) here on photo.net that, at times, have been incredibly painful for me (it's always easier to attack a person than an idea, for me as much as anyone else), but nonetheless I'm grateful for the lessons learned in people's (including my own) response to difficult topics or conversations. I don't give as much 'unqualified respect' to the opinions of people I don't know as I once did, I also hide more of myself because it's easier to attack me than an idea, but it's been part of the package in trying to formulate at least a starting point (a small step) towards answering the question of how to meaningfully and fairly approach difficult artwork. As well, this should only be taken as a preliminary proposal, a starting point (not by any means an original one at that), simply because it's an issue I'm still actively engaged with, trying to work through and produce a more fleshed-out essay on this somewhat unwieldy topic [1]. I'm offering this also in the hope that others will offer meaningful feedback on the ideas presented here, to reciprocally offer me insight-outside-my-own as I try to better assess the problem myself. I've come across, and grown to respect, the opinions of a handful of contributors to photo.net who have offered me a degree of insight into respectful disagreement, and engagement contrary to the always easier and more instinctive ad-hominem approach to seeming disparity. I hope some of those same people will find occasion to add their own insight to this pretence of my own. And so, with a degree of proverbial 'fear and trembling' ...

Three (preliminary) criteria towards the evaluation of (difficult) Art

(Robert Mapplethorpe as an obliging but unwitting example)

1. How consistent is this image relative to the life, experiences and (when known) stated intentions of the artist? (I.e., How much 'integrity' does the artwork have as an expression of the artist?)
2. Irrespective of it's content, how much technical and creative excellence is there in the execution of this photograph or particular presentation?
3. How convincing is this image, it's message, or it's depiction of reality, given my own life, experiences, and beliefs of truth and falsehood.

These seem to me like a potentially fair balance of interests in approaching any artwork. It begins with an (often difficult, and sometimes time consuming) attempt at understanding the artist, includes the more readily objective (though inescapably subjective still) 'neutrality' of creativity and technique, while still allowing for the possibility of accepting or rejecting the 'content' (once properly and fairly understood) relative to personal conviction or belief.

Criteria One

'How consistent is this image to the life and experience of the artist'. This means looking at more than the obvious surface realities of an image, and a genuine and conscientious engagement of 'why', and 'what', as to the content or choices involved in it. You might pick, for example, one of the homoerotic photographs of Robert Mapplethorpe. (I'm picking on him only because he's known to anyone who has been around photography long enough to make an attempt at engaging with photography in an art-world sense. He also fits the 'difficult image' bill.) Personally, to see many of his images is incredibly difficult for me - I even feel a remarkable 'fear' inside me (for lack of a closer bodily reaction or sensation). I approach sadomasochism with a near impossibility of fairness, simply because there are few things which seem to represent a more conscious rejection of human dignity for me. (See, I'm skipping to criteria three already, tisk tisk.) I'm a textbook liberal on artistic freedoms, true enough, but I'm also a bleeding-heart humanist beneath it all. (Yes, I know ... I was born at LEAST a century too late, woe is me.) Dreamy-eyed humanism, though, is subconscious, liberalism a choice - ergo, Mapplethorpe instinctively leaves my saying 'ouch', quietly licking my wounds and wondering what to think of something that seems, to use an often-touted word, so essentially 'dehumanizing'. And yet, because I do have a frightful 'humanist' streak inside me, and believe very fundamentally in the essential dignity of people (by no means denying the reality of human 'ugliness', though), I want to be fair to Mapplethorpe as well as try to understand why he would make the incredibly difficult images he does, which, on the surface, seem intent on representing the dehumanization of their subjects. (There's a conscientious reduction of discernible human identity, for example, in the appropriated anonymity of leather masks, etc.) This, again and again, was the word I had in my own head, but also the word I heard again and again from critics of his: 'dehumanizing'. And yet, trying to understand him, simply because I wanted to know where these feelings come from in him as an individual and as an artist, there was something odd that struck me about his photographs. Pulling one of the many books that I have which include some of his images, I made a list of all his photographs relative to the others in the book. These were the thought-provoking results for me:

Photographic prints contained in the book: 192
Photographs by Robert Mapplethorpe: 7
Photographs by Other Photographers: 185 (representing 31 photographers)

Photographs where the title contained the name(s) of the individual(s) depicted:
Robert Mapplethorpe (7 of 7 images), Full image names represented below:
* #27 Lisa Lyon, 1982
* #34 Lydia Cheng, 1987
* #67 Lydia, 1987
* #75 Derrick Cross, 1983
* #95 Lisa Lyon, 1981
* #109 Derrick Cross, 1982
* #113 Christopher Holly, 1980

Other Photographers (5 of 185 images), Photographer, image name:
* #13 Annie Leibovitz: David Parsons
* #25 Marco Glaviano: Cynthia Antonio
* #20 Arthur Elgort: Wendy Whitelaw
* #47 Ellen von Unwerth: Stephanie Seymour
* #56-7 David Seidner: Violeta Sanchez

It's only a small (and potentially silly) example, but, in assessing my reaction to whether or not these images were in fact 'dehumanizing', I was surprised and challenged to feel that these images, by assigning real names and real, historically traceable identities (I could uncover who these peoples parents are, how they lived or died, etc., if I had enough time and justification for doing so) these images might in fact be even more 'human' (in the sense of a real, singular human identity) than something like 'abstract nude #6', which we wouldn't find morally difficult to approach or label 'dehumanizing' in and of itself. (See Ellis Potter's two assertions above.) Making any effort to understand the photographer or his subject, I also come to the obligation of admitting there was a remarkable 'integrity' in the depiction not just of Mapplethorpe's life, but even in the lives of his models, which is an area where I thing most nude photography falls woefully short, and could learn a great deal from him. (Is there not in fact something vaguely dehumanizing in the representation of people in the majority of nudes, abstract and otherwise, devoid of identity or any discernible expression of their own singular beliefs and personality?) As a commitment to 'true' or fair representation of real people and real lives, I wonder if Mapplethorpe isn't in fact one of the most 'human' photographers to have worked in the last 30 years. (This, again, is something quite distinct from point three, as to whether I agree or not with the choices made by these people, etc.) Those are small and easy points, but, whatever you might think of the content, and I find it incredibly difficult, morally or otherwise, I feel obliged to admit that, as a question exclusively of integrity to outlook (both of the models and of the photographer), Mapplethorpe in fact has a lot to offer those of us who make nudes ourselves.

Anyway, I don't wish to pursue the example of Mapplethorpe unduly, simply because, as I've learned with being too personal myself, it runs the risk of becoming an easy target or opportunity to dismiss a topic important enough to avoid cheap escapes where they can be meaningfully avoided.

Criteria Two

'How much technical and creative excellence is there in the execution of this photograph'. This might be the both the easiest and the hardest criteria to assess, simply because we're governed so much by our own inescapable (if not inalterable) tastes and preferences. (For the life of me, I'll never be able to understand the religion of architecture, landscape photography, or, ugh, Country & Western music, however well they are or aren't done.) But, completely distinct (as best that's possible) from the criteria above or below it, I should be able to ask myself what level of technical excellence or appropriate creativity is represented by this image or piece of art. Again, as in the case of Robert Mapplethorpe, I think many of his images represent and incredible degree of technical accomplishment, whatever agreement or disagreement we might have on it's content or moral weight. (To demonstrate the muddy waters of criteria 1, 2, and 3, I've often heard his critics completely dismiss any technical accomplishments of his, and I'm often stunned by the quality of his images, with comments such as 'he didn't do most of his own printing', etc. Aside from the fact that this statement represents about a third of the most gifted photographers in photographic history, I tend to dismiss the criticism not because the question doesn't merit thought on it's own, but simply because it's a comment on top of a comment, and the surface criticism is a weapon to be picked up or discarded only in the lack of availability of other weapons to bash and flail a moral enemy to death with.) Even this one, particularly when we're very challenged (or troubled) by the content, can be hard, though, simply because our own ability to appreciate surface things is biased by experience and moral outlook. To take a difficult but appropriately illustrative example, if I was physically abused as a child, but say always in the same <x-coloured> room, I might have significant emotional barriers to appreciating that colour. No equation at all intended, but likewise if I've grown up with a very defined, restrictive, perhaps Victorian view of the body as something always to be hidden, I"ll probably also find it hard to appreciate nudes even on their own technical and visual merit, biased as I am by the content. Knowing those biases is obviously an enormous help, but, if there's one myth that's happily been shattered this past century, it's the myth of Objective Human Reasoning (can I hear an 'Hallelujah' ... and 'Amen!', brothers and sisters? ;-).

Criteria Three

'How convincing is this image, it's message, or it's depiction of reality, given my own life, experiences, and beliefs of truth and falsehood.' This is definitely the most dependable of the three (or at least the most readily accessible). Everyone knows what they think about how everyone (if less often they themselves) should live, no? (Hold on ... no 'Amen's and 'Hallelujah's just yet! ;-) It's an important part of approaching any piece of artwork or expression or, in fact, anything in life at all - asking the question: "Based upon my own experience, and my attempt at fair recognition of other people's experiences of reality, truth and falsehood, how 'true', 'representative', or 'valid' is the claim or statement made by this image, or the sentiment I believe it represents?" This one actually is very much related to number one, though, and it's why, despite being the first thing we instinctively feel, I put it as the last thing to critically consider. It's not because it's the least important (as in any debate, it's the last words the ultimately carry the most critical weight), but only because it can only fairly exist in relationship to the other two. There are a great many things in life that I've initially rejected outright, believing them to be saying one thing, when in fact, I've later discovered they were saying not just something altogether different, but something that I felt was completely 'true'. Ultimately, to truly (or fairly) reject something, you do first need to try and understand what it is that you're rejecting. Obviously this goes against the principle of what I think is, faced with moral conflict, human laziness and retreat. Obviously, not everyone has the time to think through every difficult piece of artwork they encounter either, or assign enough importance to the objective to justify the task. I can accept and respect that easily enough. The only fair response to difficult piece of art in the absence of clear engagement or attempts to fairly understand the expression, ideas, or communication offered to us, though, (i.e., skipping to criteria three without making the effort of criteria one or two), is a profession of non-engagement. (Even if it's a very unnatural response with content as difficult as Robert Mapplethorpes.) Integrity to ourselves and a sense of 'truth' and 'fairness' demands it.

Conclusions

Ultimately, though I can enormously and sincerely admire the integrity of Mapplethorpe to his outlook, and I'm awe-struck by the technical beauty of some of his photographs, I'm left with the obligation to reject the content of his photographs based upon personal conviction and belief of what human nature and constructive human action is and isn't. I won't give the reasons for those conclusions here because that's not relative to the discussion. What I will offer, though, however hard I find him, is the admission - and a grateful admission, since interacting with him has not only enormously challenged me, but left me with a more human and sensitive understanding of nudity as subject matter - that I think he represents one of the paramount examples of (1) integrity to vision, and (2) technical excellence, without being obliged to (3) accept the 'expression' he offers us as an audience. I don't know that I would recommend his images to other people. It, as with any 'difficult' piece of art (or cinema, as in the example of 'the Piano Teacher', which profoundly challenged and moved me, but was incredibly difficult as well), changes on a case-by-case, person-by-person basis, trying to respect the boundaries, and choices of another person, and my own estimation of what they can and can't deal with meaningfully, critically or effectively. I can't deny the reality of his challenging and praise-worthy accomplishment in criteria one or two, but nor can I accept, in good conscience, the validity of his 'expression' based upon criteria three. He'll stay comfortably on my bookshelves, and I'll long be grateful for the contribution he made to my own understanding of people and nudity in art. Having even one of those three principles, thought, leaves me with ample opportunity for appreciation, while still maintaining a respectful but critical and fundamental disagreement with him.

Postscript:

As a side note, I think we often equate 'difficulty' with 'morality' or moral worth, which is a frightful equation to say the least. A favorite example relative to instinctive Christian ('Evangelical', 'Conservative', or otherwise) rejection of the 'difficult' is to point out some of the realities of prophetic 'expression' in the Bible. There are, I think, few works of art today more graphic than some of the imagery represented in books such as Ezekiel. Were someone to make a short-film of Ezekiel 16, for example, the outcry and disgust within the church - provided the source was unknown - would be profound. This is the same man whom God commanded to bake his food with feces as a testament to the realities of the coming Exile and Siege of Jerusalem. The language of the prophets (having studied Biblical Hebrew myself) was often incredibly vulgar, and in many places has been tidied up and replaced by later generations with 'cleaner' words, the originals pushed to the margins and not read out loud during the liturgies, etc. I don't say any of this as an attack on Christianity, just as an observation that the propensity of the Christian community to reject on wholesale terms anything morally difficult, even on the calibre (in 'difficulty', not necessarily 'morality') of Mapplethorpe's images, is to be at odds with a large portion of the Judeo-Christian tradition of biblical expression, and perhaps represents current cultural values more than anything firmly rooted in the historical, Judeo-Christian limits off valid and 'appropriate' human and artistic expression. (The difficulty, for Christians or otherwise, perhaps lays in the acceptance or rejection of 'appropriate' or meritorious circumstances?) Ironically, I think the Bible, fairly treated, might even be one of the strongest defenses we have today of incredibly 'graphic' communication as valid and sometimes necessary in certain situations. Those morally difficult statements may, in the end, be far more 'humanizing' messages than many of us would initially or comfortably admit upon first glance, but clearly their measure of difficulty is no indicator of their measure of validity or worth.

Footnote

[1] Specifically, on the realities of cultural-Christian versus 'secular'/'liberal' interaction with artists like Robert Mapplethorpe, Jock Sturges, as well as recent films like 'the Piano Teacher' (Michael Haneke), etc. - trying to find the key to fair interaction with a segment of society I often have enormous difficulties with (measured portions of Conservative and Evangelical Christianity) and at times a lack of respect for, but nonetheless with whom I wish to try and fairly uncover, through historical and hermeneutic analysis, a mutual possibility or framework [if offered from the outside] of honest, respectful evaluation of or approach to morally difficult or 'provocative' artwork. I studied theology for many years, and try to remain actively interested in conservative Christian 'involvement' in the arts (book-burnings aside <grin>), so, though difficult, I do think I have it in me to be somewhat fair to Christianity, even though I maintain my many 'disagreements' with it's traditional moral and cultural engagements, 'culture' often uncritically represented as 'faith', etc. (Mercifully, I have acquaintances willing enough to remind me when I err on the side of 'preposterous' and 'unfair liberal bias'.) Ecumenical is part of the liberal package, no ... my own 'religious baggage', I suppose? ;-)
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