Masculinities in Art: Considering the ‘other’
Recent artistic projects of mine probe this “other” maleness that is inappropriately represented within Kentuckian (albeit Western) Culture. To find success in such work, my most bold points are concealed within hidden symbolism and retrospect. In my work Three Damn Figures, 2023, the roles of these subjects retain ambivalent depictions of the masculine.The individuals are referenced from Gay Photographer David Vance’s Untitled (Three Men with Vines), c. 1990.
A portion of his creative work involves the expression of gay desire and eroticism. Three Men with Vines depicts three figures who sol- emnly guard themselves behind a twisting vine that seems to pull a nature-esque background into fruition. Their gazes direct elsewhere from each other’s own bodies, almost sensing a slight glance towards the other. In my piece, I use a thick, black oil paint base to create an abyss around these characters, spotlighting them as my target. While alienated, I avert fragments of their bodies, allowing the spotlight to linger. When considering what masculinity is, there is little aesthetic responsibility when depicting the male simulacrum. Likewise, my piece does not offer that narrative, settling for a flux between physical perception and self actualization.
As I continue painting and dissecting these concepts I realize the “other” is still being legitimized. However, the masculine is a basic, performative idea of what engenders these characteristics. I’ve naively correlated the “other” to a concept of Hybrid Masculinity (a term
expounding R.W. Connell’s critical role theory of hegemonic and subordinate masculinities). This theory was criticized by the theoretician Demetrakis Z. Demetriou (2001) for its rigid- ity. He posits that hybrid masculinities demystify contemporary inequalities present between genders and race; they are not categorized. Demetriou’s most notable critique is that it resolves to agency, ill grasping of the culturally masculine ideal. In whitewashed gay communities, the standard hegemonic masculine type is repurposed as the ideal, whereas the other groups suffer from ostracization: Am I too feminine? Am I too skinny or too fat for my body to be desired? Could wealth indicate I have tri- umphed against a Queer-Exclusionist society? Does inherent masculinity exclude individuals of other gender identities?
These theories are the basic frameworks for understanding masculinity, though I suggest re-examining these dialogues to be substantial. There remains in that emerging dialogue a radical queer potential to realize. Considering Queer Futurity, José Esteban Muñoz recalls a then and there perspective to imagine the un- touchable, perfect existence of queerness. The “to be or not to be” masculine does not exist- unless is truly performative. However, the “other” will persist, especially if society chooses to absolve itself of holding masculinity to a binary. As a fragment of my work, Three Damn Figures is my method of traversing along the “could be(s)” of queer embodiment. I do believe hybrid masculinity does not encourage conversations of this “other.”
I wish to dissolve the meaning of the body and examine the fundamentals of how maleness is conceived as masculine. Admittedly, masculinity is an engendered characteristic that might not need to be reimagined. Rather, it should be realized as it belongs to various types of people who identify with the term. Isn’t that what queerness begs us to think forward to? I realize as I continuously try to poke and pry at this idea through my work, I am dissolving what I have thought masculinity means in our culture.This “other” masculine may be a curtain pulled down to glimpse towards a direction of ungendered experience and identity. And still, I am other.
