Artist blog: Charles Cohen

Charles Cohens series Buff consists of images of porn with the people photoshopped out. The people are often recognizable both as human and by their sex from the outline created in their absence and the poses are frequently so sexual that it is hard to misconstrue them, even without the aid of contextual clues in the background. These images focus on the backgrounds, which are the only source of color and also more of a foreground than the cut-out people are. This series relies on the recognition of this type of image by the audience as well as the connotations the type carries with it to inform the work. The series’ meaning is derived from the audience’s preconceived ideas interacting with the image presented.

That being said, I found this particular image to be the most interesting of the series. First, the negative space part of the image is not clearly human; to me it looked more like a weird octopus-like creature. Upon further inspection, it becomes more human in appearance, but still remains slightly abstract. This adds to the theme of dehumanization, which is apparent in the complete removal of humans from the image. The dehumanization acts in much the same way as it does in porn without the people cut out of it; the porn industry removes the individual from sex, both in terms of the subject of the image and the viewer. The removal of the pornographic image removes the only thing that people want the images for; they certainly don’t look it up to check out other people’s home décor.

The essentializing of the porn into its most basic is not singularly associated with this topic; it has the same dehumanizing effect in the way the Western world views the Eastern world and vice versa. In my Southeast Asian philosophy and religion class today we talked about how when the British colonized India they re the many different reduced the many religions of India into a singular set of beliefs which were dubbed Hinduism. This reducing of things into their most basic qualities has been going on for centuries and hasn’t changed with the advent of digital technology. Cohen flips this reductionist idea on its head by removing the only essential part of the picture.

Another interesting aspect of this image is the use of femininity. Every image in the series of a single person is a woman; there are no solo guys. I will admit that this could just be because the artist is male, but it still warrants mentioning. The female figure is particularly prone to being dehumanized in many art forms (visual and otherwise) as well as in the media and until recently through the lack of legal rights; Women gained suffrage less than one hundred years ago. As far as the issue of homosexuality is concerned in this particular image, the dehumanization of this type of image represents a broader kind of inhumanity associated with homosexuality by its opponents. The controversy surrounding the level of humanity present in people of this persuasion is still highly charged, as I’m sure everyone is aware, but to put it in context, it was only in 1973 that homosexuality was officially removed from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). (see link)

One major strength I see in Cohen’s series is his diversity in original images. The idea that no matter the starting point, the end result will be the same is a powerful one. Several of the images include a body only partially represented and cut off the edge of the picture plane, while others include multiple bodies framed entirely within the image. The images come from both sexes (with the exception of the lack of single men) and are set both indoors and outdoors with various objects surrounding the negative space.

On the whole I find Cohen’s Buff series to be both culturally enlightening as well as philosophically relevant to the question of where pornographic images fit into society and where the line is drawn to define an image as crude.



Sources:
http://www.promulgator.com/
University of California, Davis