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In Modern Society, the human body has become an intrinsically sexual, fetishised ideal. Modern culture seems to seems to obsess over the perfect shape and its gendered appeal.
In the 1970s Allen Teger did a photographic project entitled Bodyscapes, in which he decided to refashion the sensual object that is the human body into a seductive landscape. The curves of a woman's breasts become rolling hills; the masculine flatness of a man's back becomes a the setting for a motorcycle race.
In my emulation of the self-same work, I decided to keep with the concept of 'the body as landscape' but to take the project's impetus in a different direction. Instead of embellishing the sensual nature of the body, with my models I tried to remove their inherent sexiness/sexualized gender; effectively trying to dehumanize them. I also choose to replace Teger's vintage plastic toys with stuffed animal pandas — the reasoning behind which is that the panda is often caricatured by the uninformed public as a docile and innocent. The inclusion of the cuddly panda then changes the nude from an abstract human form to a surreal landscape.
In this project the supremely innocent figure is presented on the naked body to explore preconceptions and perceptions; it is impossible to view and image and not make judgments and conclusions about it, but why?
In the 1970s Allen Teger did a photographic project entitled Bodyscapes, in which he decided to refashion the sensual object that is the human body into a seductive landscape. The curves of a woman's breasts become rolling hills; the masculine flatness of a man's back becomes a the setting for a motorcycle race.
In my emulation of the self-same work, I decided to keep with the concept of 'the body as landscape' but to take the project's impetus in a different direction. Instead of embellishing the sensual nature of the body, with my models I tried to remove their inherent sexiness/sexualized gender; effectively trying to dehumanize them. I also choose to replace Teger's vintage plastic toys with stuffed animal pandas — the reasoning behind which is that the panda is often caricatured by the uninformed public as a docile and innocent. The inclusion of the cuddly panda then changes the nude from an abstract human form to a surreal landscape.
In this project the supremely innocent figure is presented on the naked body to explore preconceptions and perceptions; it is impossible to view and image and not make judgments and conclusions about it, but why?
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