May 17, 2015

"I am not surprised Fox has censored Picasso’s breasts. It is absurd and creepy to blur out the bosoms of his Women of Algiers..."

"... in a report on the painting that set a new world record this week. But it is not completely impossible to understand, because if you were a puritan or a fundamentalist or just hated women’s bodies, Picasso’s breasts are the kind of breasts you might find shocking.... Picasso’s breasts are just black circles with big dots for nipples. It is a measure of his genius that he can convey all the roundness, fullness and touchability of a breast using this graffiti-like shorthand. There are four pairs of breasts in Women of Algiers (Version O) by my count – painted in various stages of cartoonish crudity... It is a cliche to see Picasso as a misogynist whose lust for women was aggressive and patriarchal... Who hates women – Picasso who painted all those breasts, or the TV station that smeared them out?"

That's from The Guardian, scoring political points off cartoonish breasts in a painting that you'd think conservatives would want to show because it was just so darned expensive this last time it was sold and even though it knows very well that it was just some local station that was afraid someone would complain. Objections could have come from lefties as well as righties. The Guardian admits, as it must, that Picasso was a big old aggressive misogynist.

Anyway, maybe it works over in England to say "Picasso's breasts," when you only want us to think of the women's breasts that he painted, but the American mind — mine, anyway — goes straight to moobs. And Picasso is a man who often posed for pictures shirtless. I went looking for a good picture to illustrate this and I found a whole page titled "A lot of pictures of Pablo Picasso without his shirt on." I picked this one:



It's been a good year for Picasso and a good year generally for shirtless men. Mitt Romney appeared shirtless the other day (in some boxing match, but who cares?, the big deal was that he was shirtless). And images of Martin O'Malley without a shirt are continually popping up as if to say look what I can do that Hillary can't.

56 comments:

Jason said...

Look what I can do that Hillary can't.

Open his own pickle jar?

traditionalguy said...

Picasso breasts would be considered graffiti but for the worship of his Patriarchal arrogance. There are no female Picassos.

Expat(ish) said...

Didn't the guardian censor the pictures from the Draw Mohammed art show?

Pot/Kettle much?

-XC

Hagar said...

It is policy; it does not have to make sense.

Twelve said...

Picasso drew like a child. My young daughter drew better pictures. A time will come when people laugh at the prices commanded for his work.

Fritz said...

Bear in mind it was one local Fox affiliate and not national Fox news, who ran the picture unedited.

https://twitter.com/TheDCVince/status/598947199633006592/photo/1

bleh said...

One Fox affiliate? So not Fox News.

I wouldn't expect a writer at the Guardian to understand the difference.

Lyle said...

Fox didn't blur the painting

damikesc said...

Yeah it wasn't FNC and they won't print Mohammad drawings. Say hello to our protectors of free speech for the Western world.

Wince said...
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Rose said...
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Etienne said...

I don't think they got Air Conditioning in France until 1985...

Censorship is big business now...

lemondog said...

Muslim women?

I had to laugh when the media showed this spindly arms and all, for whatever reason.

O'Malley at least looks reasonably buff.

Wince said...

Fair and balanced, I see at least one cunt visible in the picture.

lemondog said...

Buttocks not censored.

Unknown said...

It's not a 'good year' for Picasso. He's dead.

Drago said...

"I am not surprised Fox...."

"..Fox.."

They knew if was a Fox affiliate and not Fox News so they simply muddied the waters knowing the legions of Low Info lefties would line up to receive and internalize the appropriate "narrative".

This was also a pre-emptive counterattack on anyone who happens to notice that these "courageous" "Lefties Of The Newsroom" continue their bowing down to radical islamists and the demand to never, evah!, show a picture of muhammed (or, as the lefties ALWAYS say: "The Prophet Muhammed", thereby conferring legitimacy to the one faith the left is most concerned about protecting).

rhhardin said...

Karen L Kleinfelder as a nicer book-length analysis of Picasso's relation to his models. Find it in some university library.

She did think, however, that Picasso stopped drawing models at age 80 when he came to terms with his mortality, which is a woman's misunderstanding.

The babe neuron simply stopped firing. He became objective about genitalia. He becamr unchained from a maniac, as some Greek put it.

In the meantime, Fox has to do what Fox has to do.

I'm looking for Fox's treatment of Studio 347.

rhhardin said...

I have three accidental Picassos up.

Etienne said...
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lemondog said...

re: Picasso, interesting picture.

His fingernails are painted. What is he holding in either hand and his left knee appears painted with the image of a bird?

rhhardin said...

The breast censorchip isn't to protect the viewer but to protect women in the workplace who imagine that it inflames men into sexual thoughts.

It's a feminist deal, not a Victorial prude deal.

rhhardin said...

Picasso came to represent assholes with an asterisk.

Remember that whenever you see a footnote.

Sebastian said...

"Picasso was a big old aggressive misogynist"

But pinko, which makes up for it.

YoungHegelian said...

There's some Picasso that needs to be censored before it could get shown on TV. (link NSFW)

As others have pointed out, it was not the Fox network which censored the painting (actually, FN & FBN showed it uncensored when they covered the auction), but it was a Fox outlet in that most repressed & puritanical of US locations, New York City. Who knew the Big Apple was such a hot bed of Christian fundamentalist fervor?

Actually, snark aside, it would be interesting to know why a NYC Fox affiliate saw fit to censor a painting that the national network didn't. You why I think they censored it? Not because of blowback from Christians, but because of fear of offending Orthodox Jews & Muslims.

David said...

It's not the breasts that Picasso was showing off in that outfit.

richard mcenroe said...

The only way I'd give a damn about a nude descending a staircase is if Harpo Marx or Benny Hill was chasing her.

I'm couth that way.

chuck said...

Breasts? I thought those were eyes.

Robert Cook said...

"Picasso drew like a child."

When he aspired to, he did. Other times, he drew representationally as masterfully as anyone. He is on record as wishing he could draw with the freedom of children.

"My young daughter drew better pictures."

No, she didn't.

"A time will come when people laugh at the prices commanded for his work."

Could be, and rightly so. There is no artist or single artistic work that warrants prices in the hundreds of millions of dollars...unless the purchaser is a major museum who intends to preserve the art and make it available for the public to view.

dbp said...

"But it is not completely impossible to understand, because if you were a puritan or a fundamentalist or just hated women’s bodies, Picasso’s breasts are the kind of breasts you might find shocking.... "

What! Picasso's depictions of women's bodies makes me think he hated women's bodies. Real breasts are both alluring and beautiful, Picasso's versions are generally crude and ugly. Art is art, but I don't see any reverence for women or their bodies in his work.

Drago said...

Robert Cook: " There is no artist or single artistic work that warrants prices in the hundreds of millions of dollars...unless the purchaser is a major museum who intends to preserve the art and make it available for the public to view."

I, on the other hand, am happy to allow the free market to determine the worth of such items.

No explanation is required to see why that thought eludes you.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

Why do you use the title of the post to transition into something other than the topic of FOX's (and their viewers?) weirdness in feeling sexually threatened by Picasso's work?

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

Art is art, but I don't see any reverence for women or their bodies in his work.

It's called "putting the pussy on the pedestal", DBP.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

You why I think they censored it? Not because of blowback from Christians, but because of fear of offending Orthodox Jews & Muslims.

Haha. Lol. Really? You actually think enough of them are watching FOX?

n.n said...

Nipple warning.

Diamondhead said...

Rhythm and balls seems to be among the low info folks that think it was Fox News that censored the picture.

Michael K said...

Picasso had the hots for Sarah Murphy but she rejected him and so he pointed himself out of this painting in which the third image can be seen on x-ray.

Dr Weevil said...

Rhythm and Balls at work: he knows it wasn't FOX, it was a single Fox affiliate in New York, but he says it was "FOX" twice in three comments because he can't resist any opportunity to misrepresent the truth to advance his cause. ('Misrepresent' is of course a euphemism here.)

Fabi said...

Interesting that Cook mentioned that Picasso drew like a child when he aspired to do so. I just went upstairs to my guest bath to see a signed and numbered lithograph of 'Flowers (for U.C.L.A.)'.

It can only be described as juvenile, although I suspect that this was nothing more than a doodle for Pablo. Unfortunately, it's not worth hundreds of millions - it's probably worth no more than a few thousand bucks. No idea as to its acquisition cost - it's a hand-me-down.

YoungHegelian said...

@R&B,

Haha. Lol. Really? You actually think enough of them are watching FOX?

As pointed out above, it was the affiliate not the Network.

Also, please pay attention to what I wrote, which includes the words "Orthodox Jews". Orthodox Jews tend to lean strongly Republican, unlike their Reform, Conservative, or secular cousins.

As for Muslims, they historically voted Republican, but have moved Democrat under Obama. But, Democratic or not, they are notoriously socially conservative, and so probably do watch Fox News.

Clyde said...

Pablo Picasso was never called an asshole...

Birches said...

Picasso drew like a child. My young daughter drew better pictures. A time will come when people laugh at the prices commanded for his work.

I have an artist friend that draws incredible stick figures that evoke emotion and movement. They're just stick figures and yet, I could never begin to reproduce their feeling.

Titus said...

Man boobs and old man asses are the worst thing in the world.

Alex said...

Hate Cubism all you want, it was an innovation in art.

chickelit said...

Conservatives win big in Britain and art wankers lash out against things conservative.

Boring and predictable

DrSquid said...

Read the comments down to about here before reading the article in The Guardian. Man, that is some bullshit piece of writing, expect it came from some promising high school junior rather a professional. I'm not real sure what jejuene means, but I think this essay is it.

And Titus, I'm an old man but if you saw my ass you would cry yourself to sleep.

But you ain't never gonna see it.

chickelit said...

When will art-wanker-in-chief Roger Waters float his next trial balloon in response to the British elections?

Lewis Wetzel said...

I always pronounce Picasso's name "pick-uh-SO" and if someone tries to correct me, I cross my arms, look them straight in the eye, and tell them I have a degree in art from the University of California at San Diego.

Drago said...

Titus: "Man boobs and old man asses are the worst thing in the world"

Honest self-reflection is the first step on the path to improving oneself.

Petunia said...

I'm not surprised that so many low-information people and liberals (but I repeat myself) refused or were unable to realize that the ill-advised censorship was done by ONE producer on ONE Fox affiliate in ONE city and had absolutely nothing to do with Fox News. Most of the left doesn't bother to read beyond the inflammatory headlines of articles like these, and over-reacts with their usual idiocy. They probably look at the word "Fox" as a "micro-aggression". Morons.

The Hilltop View of Morris County said...

I'd just like to ask: Who does O'Malley think he is, another Putin?

damikesc said...

Why do you use the title of the post to transition into something other than the topic of FOX's (and their viewers?) weirdness in feeling sexually threatened by Picasso's work?

Why mention FOX and not the one affiliate who ACTUALLY did it?

paminwi said...

damikesc: because she fell for "the FoxNews bad" as did idiot Rhythm and Balls. Anything and everything to skewer Fox News in any way, shape or form.

Fen said...

Meh. Who cares what all the pedophiles at the Guardian think.

Oh that was the BBC not the Guardian? Whatever, same thing.

Good. Goose. Gander.

cf said...

I love these pics of Picasso, it reminds me of the heroic, native nakedness of Gandhi.

Hurray for great visionary Men.

mikee said...

Things Hillary can't do that other candidates can do needs to include:

1. Full financial disclosures

2. Accurate filing of taxes

3. Answer questions truthfully

4. Explain her politics, domestic or foreign, in anything other than meaningless platitudes

5. Discuss opposition polical viewpoints without demonization of opponents

6. Govern without corruption

The idea of Hillary as president makes thinking people uneasy, and knowledgeable people nauseous.