Queer Gaze and Gay Gesture:
Manet
1x1 by Oscar Villegas-Paez
by Jerry Tartaglia
Even the most casual
observer will recognize that something is “not-quite-Manet” when viewing the
reclining figure in Olympe. Chris & Agit by Oscar
Villegas-Paez. First,
the image is a black and white photographic print, not oil on canvas. Secondly,
the size of the image is quite smaller than the Manet original. And most striking
to the viewer is the subject, whose longing stare is both quizzical and
seductive. But the startling difference between Villegas-Paez’ subject and
Manet’s is that the figure is a young man. Taken on its own, one might be
disposed to assume that the photograph is scoffing at the stylized pose of the
Manet original. But when viewed in the context of the fifty gelatin print
photographic series entitled Manet 1 x 1, the image reveals that
Villegas-Paez is an artist whose work uses the subject of Manet’s painting to
observe and communicate new meanings about human interaction through
gesture. (Olympe image click here)
In each of the fifty
large format photographs, the camera qua viewer
is calculated into the interaction of the figures. And it is in that
calculation that the work is most challenging, because gesture is the means by
which human interaction is defined. The
pre-determined assumption that underlies the Manet originals is that the gaze
of the viewer of the paintings is heterocentric: a heterosexual male, or a
female who is subordinate to one.
Heterocentricism is a
point of view. It differs from homophobia in that it does not necessarily
represent hostility against sexually different people. It merely point towards
the presumptions that result from heterosexual acculturation. The inviting
sexual pose of the young man in Villegas-Paez’ version of Manet’s
The central role of
shame in Queer consciousness has been cited by Douglas Crimp in several of his
essays. He has discussed how shame can
be used as a means of validation of the Queer sensibility. There is no stronger example of this in the Manet 1 x 1 series than there is in Danae. Nicolae & Diego,
which
is an adaptation of Manet’s “Boy With A Pitcher.” (Danae image click
here) Here, as in the Manet painting, a young man pours
water into his mouth from a pitcher. In the painting one barely notices that
the spout of the pitcher resembles the head of a penis. But in the
Villegas-Paez photograph, the male sensuality is brought to life and directly
into the viewer’s sight. Danae is a modified composition. The
foreground shows a nude young man eagerly drinking the liquid from the phallic
headed pitcher, while a second ephebe pees, in the background of what might be
a cave. This second youth turns towards
the camera over his shoulder and captures the now-Queer gaze of the
viewer. We are made complicit in the
golden shower love-making of the two youths through the eyes of the second
young man. A seemingly private act is made shameless through our own Queer
voyeurism.
The Boat. David & Enrique is
adapted from Manet’s Boating, and it,
too portrays two young men, one of whom meets the gaze of the camera qua viewer. (The Boat image
click here) But here the photographer uses the
Queer situation to alter the power relationship between the persons in Manet’s
painting. The female figure in the
painting sits as an apparent captive of the male. Her future rests upon the
direction of the oar as it is turned by the male. In The Boat, however, the relaxed beneficiary of the efforts of the
rower could as easily command the boat. There are together in the boat, in
love, at peace, as equals. Each of the two young men seem to be rapt in their
own thoughts, but the rower’s gaze connects to the viewer’s, and we are drawn
into the intimacy of their moment together on the lake.
Part of the
effectiveness of the imagery in Manet 1 x
1 is derived from the relationship between the photographer and the models.
Each is a family member or friend. In
the photographic situation each must confront and incorporate the anxiety that
is created by public exposure, gender bending, or visible homoeroticism. That
anxiety feeds the energy of the moment and is often visible in the photographs.
Villegas-Paez’
A Faun’s Afternoon. Jesus is
based upon the Fifer. In Manet’s painting, the adolescent boy,
proudly clad in his uniform, plays his piccolo, with a flute slung over his
shoulder, positioned as if to suggest the phallus. It is a remarkable study of repressed male
sexual expression. One imagines the boy growing into a man who is alienated
from and unaware of his own eroticism. He is a creature whose own physicality
is masked in symbol and sign. A Faun’s
Afternoon, however, reveals a vibrant male eroticism, and, by virtue of its
publicity, it is a Queer eroticism: one that celebrates the shameful, the
uncivilized, and the pagan. (A Faun image click here) Here
we see a young man, standing frontally nude with a semi turgid penis, flute to
his mouth, with his left leg poised forward as if in a dance. Around the room
are pillows from which the young man may have emerged, an open magazine, and
clothing on the floor, all suggesting that the ephebe recently completed an act
of self love and rose to celebrate by playing his flute, a modern version of
the “pipes of pan.” There are also
several drums, instruments of the wild boys, often used in the contemporary
mens’ movement to reconnect with the erotic male self. The “drumming groups” that developed as part
of this new mens’ movement sought to use the process of rhythmic music making
to ritualize the physical aspects of the erotic in order to approach its
spiritual dimension. The Goat-God, Pan, who, in the Middle Ages of European
Culture was transformed into the Devil, was originally the flute playing,
omni-erotic God, who straddled the physical and the spiritual dimensions of
male sexuality. As such, he embodies the Queer in everyman. The young Fauno is his contemporary manifestation.
There is another image, less overt, but no
less intense in its embodiment of the masculine. Remembering Watteau. Max & Pablo shows two prepubescent
boys and a donkey. (Remembering image click here)
One, seated on
the ground apparently engrossed in his thoughts, and the main subject of the
image, clad in white, legs apart in a stance that defies the onlooker to challenge
him, his donkey, and his friend. It is at once a posture that is defiant as
well as protective. The boy’s gaze into the eyes of the viewer asks us “what
business do you have here?” Thus it is an independent, self-proclaiming Queer
image.
Lastly, there is a self portrait of the
artist, Oscar Villegas-Paez, entitled Self
Portrait as The Surprised Nymph in Nunhead Cemetary. (Self Portrait image click here) (Posed naked, he leans against a gravestone
in a cemetery, clasping himself as if embarrassed to reveal his breasts and
genitals. His gaze scolds the viewer for this untoward incursion into his
privacy. Whereas Manet’s portrayal is meant to suggest the Nymph is an
accomplice in the seductive ritual of the heterocentric gaze prompted by the
painting’s constructs, Villegas-Paez’ self portrait repels the heterocentric.
The fifty photographs as a unity, offer the viewer the alternative point of
view upon the world – a liberated masculinity.
It is an expression of a masculinity that has been relieved of
obligatory self repression. That freedom is a liberation that requires only the
relinquishing of the heterocentric assumption in order to be attained.