I’m not often impressed by visual art, or at least institutionally accepted artsy-fartsy art, that engages with artificial intelligence. Most AI-related art fails to outshine or even match the wackadoo aesthetics of naïve AI slop produced by the Internet, whether heartfelt Charlie Kirk memorials showing the Turning Point guru paling around with Abraham Lincoln and … Continue reading
I’ve always been drawn to darker, more seductive, and, in some circles, taboo imagery, particularly in formats more readily available to a non-fine art audience, such as books or magazines. The more risqué, the better. It is exciting when people find community within their niche tastes, where open sexuality is not just celebrated but encouraged … Continue reading
Can receiving the stigmata be a sex act? It is surely intimate and sensual, not to mention penetrative. This is a question that I’ve been musing on ever since fixating on Giovanni di Paolo’s shimmering, submissive 15th-century panel painting, Saint Catherine of Siena Receiving the Stigmata, on view in the Met Cloister’s heroically horny and … Continue reading
I wish I hadn’t purposefully visited Christopher Gambino’s window installation, The Christmas Show at Below Grand. Not because I wish I could erase it from my mind, but I dream of stumbling upon this festive furniture crime scene by happenstance. A momentary look to my right while walking down Orchard Street. A glance at a … Continue reading
A dour-looking, ruddy-faced Quaker, who, after a heavenly bout of what was likely typhus in the same year that our founding daddies signed the Declaration of Independence, was resurrected as “a genderless servant of God.” A swivel-eyed polyamorous duo who bred unicorns (or really, did questionable surgeries on goats), one of which, named Lancelot, hit … Continue reading
Can ball gags be wholesome? Can an object stuffed into your gaping mouth, eyes watering as you struggle to slurp back a swallow, be family-friendly? Can that same ball gag, yanked into place by a leather harness with straps cutting sharp diagonals across your face, be a suitable accessory for a lovely, casual dinner with … Continue reading
A young boy in a rumpled maroon T-shirt and jeans pushes a wheelchair filled to the brim with heavy yellow plastic water jugs. His face is a spectral smear with a hint of a nose, a curved ear, and a slight, concentrated frown. These indistinguishable features not only obscure his identity but mark his effort … Continue reading
Two deer stare, stunned, their ears perked nervously straight up. Their sweet brown eyes have turned zombie white, caught in a camera flash rather than the headlights of a speeding Ford F-150 barreling down a dirty back road at night. One looks like she’s about to bolt, her body tensed in the tall grasses in … Continue reading
Nightlife photography should be kinda bad. Technical perfection is for shut-ins with a studio or all those photographers making photographs of photographs. Nightlife photos should be out of focus and crappily framed. Heads should be lopped right off dancing bodies, fixating instead on torsos bumping and grinding into each other (and the photographer). Flashes of … Continue reading
Nobody can convince me that ASMA’s dolls don’t come alive and skitter all over SculptureCenter at night. That these little featureless skeletal femme creatures don’t pop up when the doors lock to tinker with the accessories placed around them—playing cards while lounging in the nude, tinkling the keys of their piano used as a momentary … Continue reading