| Spring's about shedding winter coats and winter blues. It's a time when the world wakes from slumber and gets a little bit wild. Thus, we present to you The Wild Issue.
Over the next few weeks we'll take a look at some pretty wild people, places and things. We're not talking about drunken revelry here, we're talking about the primal, the adventurous, the outlandish, the untamed and the ferocius. Who better to start with, then, than German artist Matthias Herrmann?
Herrmann sheds more than just the winter coat - he sheds it all to offer the viewer an unadulterated view of the gay male body, the humor in morality and the risky business of exhibitionism. This isn't the first time we've mentioned Mr. Herrmann here. The celebrated photographer first came up way back in September when we featured his "cum shot" shots. This is, however, the first time we've interviewed the former head of Vienna's Secession and we couldn't be more pleased with the results. See what Herrmann has to say about changing the face of gay art, why HIV positive men are still sexy and the difference between taboo and a secret, after the jump. And when you're done with that, be sure to head on over to his website to see more of Herrmann's - er - body of work. Andrew Belonsky: As I mentioned, this is "The Wild Issue". Some people may associate the sexual nature of your work with "the wild", which, I suppose, is true. It's sexy, it's carnal, it's primal, but it's also wild in another sense: it's outlandish, extraordinary, shocking. Do you intend to shock the viewer into paying attention, into gazing upon your body and dissecting it to get the point across? Matthias Herrmann: Not necessarily. Who can really be shocked today by seeing a naked male body? All of us are quite used to seeing (images of) male genitalia. So it cannot be the imagery that some people might find shocking, but the context in which it is shown and the broader context single photographs create. And maybe the posture one finds behind the work as a whole – that might be shocking to some. The potential to shock has much more to do with the beholder than the creator, I think. A housewife from Georgia will be shocked by different images than the hooker from New York. The notion of "community values" as a means to decide what is acceptable is so dangerous: it creates the smallest denominator that does not do justice to anyone. AB: Can you explain your use of color in your previous work? 1999's "Blue" was, obviously, blue. The "xx portfolio" had green and pink. But, in recent years, you seem to have moved away from such color saturation. It's more of a background than an overarching swatch of color. MH: In the beginning, color allowed me to stay real close to the subject/object and reach for a certain abstraction at the same time. Color is emotion – of course many people experience color in different ways, which I like. When the work became less abstract – less fragmented body parts – color became less and less important. AB: How does your new work differ from previous excursions? MH: I do see quite a linear – albeit not very planned – development from the abstract to the more concrete. Not only when it comes to what is depicted, but also where – I am moving out of the studio, or the hotel room used as studio, into landscape (I am working on a series in an Italian landscape) or the public space – there is a series of works photographed in exhibitions of other artists at the Secession in Vienna, which I was the President of for seven years. The attributes of sickness became more dominant over the years. Right now I am working on a series of portraits, but I have no clue yet where that is leading me. AB: You have said that your work is not self-portraiture. There's a distinct message behind your imagery. Can you, in your own words, tell the readers what you're trying to convey? MH: Oh my. A starting point for the work has been to reach for a broader image of the male body than what was conveyed when I started in the early 90’s. The prevalent image of the gay male body in the media and the arts was the healthy, pretty boy in beautiful poses. Any moment of danger was eliminated – I believe as an answer to AIDS. All needed to be pretty and healthy. No dark sides. I wanted an image that was more diverse. I wanted to know whether we – well, I know it’s tricky to speak of "we" here – can control and/or develop our own image. And how that image could possibly be developed along the lines of our/my agenda. AB: There’s a distinct activist aspect to your work. You challenge popular concepts of masculinity, the HIV positive gay man, the gay man in general, gender - the list goes on. I know an art history student who insists that art with a function is not art at all. Work that either has a specific duty - the most obvious example would be furniture - or a social directive does not qualify as "art". What would you say to this? Would you say that messages can derail art? MH: I’d send the art history student General Idea’s video piece "Shut the fuck up". Good art always has a "mission" and art that is interesting needs to place itself in a social context – the whole idea of l’art pour l’art is crap. Which does not mean that art needs to follow a social – or any other – agenda. It does not just happen outside of society and the realm of the real. So there always is a message, even if the message is: "leave me alone". AB: A secret's something you keep to yourself. Something private you hide away from the world. A taboo, meanwhile, is the public secret - the secret shamed by normative scrutiny. Your work, on the surface, deals with the taboo. At the same time, the boundaries between private and public have collapsed to such an astounding degree, that taboo nearly ceases to exist. Do you believe in taboo? If so, what is it? MH: Taboos constantly shift. For me, the interesting point is who is creating or upholding taboos. In patriarchal societies, for instance, female bleeding had to be erased from public view – even the fluids in tampon ads are blue. Why? Certain parts of – especially American – society try to grant imagery of naked children the status of taboo, while at the same time nothing is really done to prevent child abuse within the family or in a religious setting. Taboos are symbolic capital and stand for power mechanisms that need to be hidden in order to be effective. Taboos cater to the majority and those "in power". Self-victimization is one of society’s most horrible tools – at the same time it is always good to know one’s place in dominant society and which place one would like to rather be. AB: You were infected with HIV on June 10, 1999. How were you infected? MH: Major mishap. A broken condom. Before that I believed broken condoms were a modern myth in order to belittle one’s own irresponsible behaviour. Fellas, it can be the bitter truth. But, I am not opening up a discussion between innocent and guilty "AIDS victims" here. For me every HIV+ person is innocent. At the same time this is no picnic. You better be careful and protect yourself and your partner(s). AB: The HIV narrative runs through your work. You've said that through your images, you hope to challenge popular concepts of the dying gay man. You literally overpower that image. At the start of your career, this was quite groundbreaking. And, really, it still is. What I think is most remarkable about your work is that you demolish the idea of the sexually impotent HIV infected gay man. The concept that an HIV positive man can still be sexually alluring – and, despite what you may say or think, you're still quite attractive - remains on the fringes in broader gay communities. What do you have to say about this? MH: We all know that there are billions of sexual active HIV+ men out there. And some of them have great sex with other positive or with negative men. Being positive is neither a sign for passivity nor for abstinence. It should or could be a sign for responsibility. But there is a wide gap between the activity and the imagery, between what we do and what we're supposed/told to do. With this I do not speak in favor of bare backing. I am coming back to what I've said about taboos: what you do not see, what you cannot speak about, does not exist on a certain level. And sometimes a very specific level of visibility is needed. So let's look at many gorgeous positive men. AB: You once told Jop from BUTT: "A lot of people get this hyper-masculinity and vanity out of my work, more than I do. I'd like people to see that it's not about me as some kind of porn stud. It's vulnerability. It's not about gaining power, but more about displaying masculine power in order to take it away." At the same time, however, you hope to portray a more virile gay man - an alternate image to prevailing ideas. Forgive my confusion, but by challenging masculinity – by making it vanish – do you then return to the original image? MH: Confusion of course is a great tool when it comes to discussing gender identity. I am not a schizophrenic, but there are lots of souls in my head and my body. The sissy boy that wants to be the macho man. The loner who wants to be the party animal. The skinny smooth dancer who wants to be the hairy, beefy construction worker. The dying man who wants to be young and healthy. The white, middle class, middle aged man who wants to be the wild freak in a Genet movie. I don’t buy the concept of a fixed (sexual) identity – we’re all much more diverse than we think we may be. We limit ourselves – and I do not exclude myself here at all – by adhering to certain images of what is desirable, what is acceptable, and what is not. Masculinity is great and sexy. As is vulnerability and tenderness. There is always somebody out there with a bigger cock than your own. Be diverse. Oh – that sounds like Calvin Klein’s "Just Be". Right? Advertising is much more clever than we believe most of the time. How can anybody believe to be able to ever be ahead of it? AB: You prefer your work in book format. You joked that it's easier to transport, but do you think it's in your blood? Your family did, after all, work in publishing? MH: Might be. I just love books – the privacy a book grants can never be reached by artwork in an exhibition. I also love the possibilties of sequence, narration without a linear focus, that a book can provide much easier than an exhibition. Books can be very compact and very open at the same time. And they are easily available, travel better than exhibitions... My favorite arts institutions are New York’s Printed Matter and Toronto’s Art Metropole – both book stores at heart. AB: You've described your work as pornographic, but not erotic. Erotic, you've said, has a softer edge. Can you elaborate on this idea, please? MH: Erotica for me is rather the beautiful boy in beautiful poses described earlier. Erotica does not question any status quo, but adheres to it. Erotica is for everyone. Erotica we like. Whereas porn is the wild thing. But I am really not sure that I myself described my work as pornographic. Sometimes it qualifies as porn (especially for US customs, I’m afraid). And I’ve heard some guys use it as porn, which I’ve always taken as a compliment, but, above all, the work is art. www.queerty.com — Wed, Apr 11, 2007 — |