It Looks Like a Landscape
2004
Digital black-and-white photograph
120 in. x 20 ft.
source: http://www.bampfa.berkeley.edu/mahjongartists/index.html
Am i suppose to take this seriously? Damned if i do and damned if i don't. I really wish I had near sightedness when entering the gallery, but even so the bodies are still obvious.
"Butts!" i thought. it's a funny thought, i mean, i don't know why people thing real looking, ugly naked bodies are funny, but they are. so am I suppose to burst out laughing? Is this work meant to be inspire that comic effect or not? How serious can I take this?
and the idea of having this in the museum. it's great. watching my own reaction looking and thinking about this photo is a reflection opportunity. it's like " i see butts mooning each other and pubic hair flaming out, not to mention flab of fatness squeezed into folds, am I not suppose to be amused?" And yes, i feel like i am not suppose to for some reason, because of the setting of the display, in a museum, which empowers the photo as a serious work of art. which it is. but i am obligated to contain my expression, and try not to be shallow and observe the beauty and genius elements of the photo. But hey! if i purposely refrain myself from laughing because i am somehow influenced by my environment to do so, and only because of the environment that I do so, than that really makes the observation shallow. This is how I think this photo is so interesting. it's got its creative and artistic values, but how it effects viewer reactions and in some ways manipulate that reaction is what's fascinating to me about this photo.
No comments:
Post a Comment