I have spent a great deal of my life trying to differentiate between sex and sensuality. It feels like it is often a fine line that I have often crossed without really understanding which side of the line I was actually on. Some guys are just naturally oozing with a raw sensuality while others are very mechanical and get stuck in a pattern. One of my favorite lines from the play Chicago when they are in court is describing Amos making love to Roxy as he’s twisting his hands, as if rubbing her boobs but in the motion “…as if adjusting a carburetor. I love you honey, I love you”. I feel like most of my life has been lived on the sensual side. I love romance, soft light, am passionate about kissing, lips gently, but aggressively playing off your partner’s mouth, the tenderness of our lips colliding, wrapping, wet, licking, tasting. I like to look deep into the eyes of the person I am with to watch the expression on their face as you make love to them. I have recently fallen in love with the cover art from old romance novels that are illustrated in the most perfect vision imaginable. There is a passion, the embrace, the woman with her neck back, extended, bare as the man holds her in a firm embrace with a raging intensity in his eyes and a soft supple boldness to his mouth and lips. Those cover images just take you to that place and you can feel the sensuality oozing out for you to pick it up and buy it. Unfortunately, we don’t really see this in gay literature of this sort. So why is it that when men are together it is portrayed so differently? Recently my friend Alison, whom I adore, asked me if I would be interested in creating a cover for her upcoming book, about three men in a relationship. She has a basic outline and I love where she is going with it and I think the cover somehow should hearken back to those days of the old torrid romance novels, hence my research on the subject. Of course it will be about beautiful light. So does beautiful light make an image sensual? Men have sex in small cubical in the back room of a video arcade lit merely with the flicker of porn flashing across the screen. Is this actually just sex or does it cross the boundary of sensual. After all they are generally strangers and the light though artistic not necessarily romantic. In my mind’s eye I live and dwell in that world of the romance novel cover from the 50’s or possible 60’s. It’s my vision of my world and I see how much of this I bring to my work in the studio. I think most of my images are sensual without being sexual. Sometimes I work to the verge of those images crossing into a sexual nature. I have always been leery of seeing a man’s penis exposed in the image, because for most that distinguishes the line moving toward porn and I began this year with a questions “Does showing a man’s penis make an image pornographic” which turns out the be the most read posting I have written all year, so there seems to be a lot of people interested in the subject as there is no right answer because of its subjective nature in the mindset of the viewer? Some cultures are conditioned for it and some against. I know I discard an awful lot of images to get to the ones that really capture the essence of view on the subject. But it’s really what makes this sort of imagery fascinating and pulls us in. Pornography gives us the wanker; we are either wowed by something extraordinary in it, or merely click on searching for something better to ignite our fantasy. I am captivated by the images that make me want to linger and pull me in igniting something deep within myself. To me this is what this sort of art should be and what I am committed to produce with each image I work.
A 20-something Experience
I was invited to a party last night for one of my 20-something model’s boyfriend’s birthday. I was hesitant not sure I should go, because I knew I would be completely out of place. But this is a kid that I have really connected with in the studio and we have always gotten extremely good images. And, he had emailed me a couple of times throughout the week inviting and reminding me so I felt like I had to at least make an appearance. When I arrived on the street there was no place to park, it was dark and I was not quite sure where I was actually going? So I parked and walked with a case of beer in search of the place. It was easy to find because of the music and I could hear the chatter of people. It was a small apartment with not much furniture jammed full of people, young 20-somethings everywhere. I ran into Shey, the birthday boy as soon as I came through the door and delight filled his face as he gave me a warm hug and was glad that I had actually shown up. He quickly found George, his boyfriend who also came to welcome me. I opened a beer and guzzled it down and began to take in my surroundings. It was a lower level, possibly two-bedroom apartment, with festive decorative stuff strewn all about the room for the occasion. I quickly began to recognize many faces I had only seen on line or had occasionally chatted with on Facebook. Everyone seemed to be filled with such a drunken happiness. Suddenly, I felt like I was transported back in time perhaps thirty years earlier and as I began to mingle and fit into this 20-something crowd, I really began to realize how much out of touch I had grown from this generation. What became even more apparent was how much my photography does not fit into or with the group of subjects, that I am trying to really explore. Everyone has always entered my world and mostly seen what I am doing from my perspective. I began to look at images on cell phones of parties and postures and gestures that were fun, alive and full of energy. Even George, who I adore photographing, seem to have such life working the crowd. Why don’t I capture that? That is the vitality of youth! It suddenly smacked me right in the face that I truly am not capturing the essence of these kids at all. I still love to beauty of what I do, and I have a greater appreciation for them wanting to enter my world but I realize what a hermit I have become in my own mind. How my vision may not extend beyond myself at all, and how much I love in my memory. Hence this blog project, I guess. To enter a Spartan world of the 20-something kids, and see their lives filled with such joy, to live in such humble settings, I see how much I have grown over the past so many years and what has brought me to this place. My studio is a luxury place by comparison. How did I suddenly get here? Is it just the years of accumulation of stuff, of refining, defining, and the orchestration of life? I have always seen myself as a minimalist. I had very little when I lived and worked on the road. I prided myself on being able to live out of one suitcase. Didn’t have a car for a long time, didn’t need one. The process of growth has been enormous as the simplicity has disappeared. I am so lucky to be exactly where I am even as I try to awkwardly try to explain the means of my existence to strangers in a crowd where most of them are struggling in the end to just get by. As I crawled into my big comfortable bed with soft linens and down pillows I felt satisfied that I had ventured into that unknown, that my life has been well earned.
DENIAL!!!!!!!
A wet, cold, rainy morning, I got up and began making white bean, sausage, mushroom, and leek soup. I felt like I needed some comfort food this morning and am feeling very isolated and alone. Worked turned into I-phone nightmare hell yesterday as we had to follow and provide documentation of every single delivery and had to make multiple attempts until they were all delivered beyond all reasonable effort. I then managed to come home and completely disable the log in and all access to the new site. I was up half the night with Julian trying to regain entry. This morning I am cold, tired and very despondent so making soup seems to be giving me some comfort. I love to cook and am very creative when it comes to the kitchen. I learned to cook from my grandmother out on the ranch. She was very good cook and actually spent several years cooking for the schools. My grandmother Cyr was a genius when it came to blending foods. It always seemed so simple. She and I would always cook up a storm. My mother on the other hand could not cook at all, but then again she didn’t like food and didn’t like to eat. My mother once made chocolate chip cookies so hard that we couldn’t even eat them. My dad and I went down to the river and began skipping them across the water and they skipped too. She caught us doing it and became so furious she never made cookies again.
When I became a freshman in high school in the late 70’s, about the time Star Wars the original movie was released, I wanted to take home economics. I was already a great cook and doing most of the family meals. But, back then it was a very unmanly thing to do. I was the only boy in the entire history of the school to want to take such a class. But I was adamant and persistent and probably could have taught the class as we learned to make cream puffs and Jell-O salads with fruit of course. Hello, why wasn’t my gay bell going off then? Looking back I was totally gay. Why was it that everyone saw it but me? DENIAL!!!!!!!!! Had no idea, I , what it really meant or that a man could actually have sex or even a relationship with another man. Damn, how naive could I be? I became the manager for the school wrestling team and I remember lust and desire growing out of the locker room, but still nothing. A world of perfection designed for a kid like me and yet no ding, ding, ding. DENIAL!!!!!!!! Just a lot of spoiling the sheets and alone time in the last stall in the bathroom when no one was around. I just needed a role model and not just sneaking off to find my mother’s Playgirl Magazines hidden under her side of the mattress, and I don’t even know how I knew that???? It’s funny and how curious times in our lives become, for something that is so organic and obvious that we just can’t see within ourselves. And people still don’t think we are born this way. Hello, as a kid it doesn’t seem to be an option by choice, but a struggle for resistance. I drove my brother, a year younger out into the country, to get laid for this first time, and waited in the car all the two minutes it took to happen, but for me there was nothing? Damn, DENIAL!!!!!! I cured the fact that I just could not be normal. More time spent alone in the shed behind the house thinking about what I desired and wanted, fearful, lusting, loathing, longing, desperately trying to discover the missing link. At least this has cheered me up this morning and I can laugh thinking back and I get up to stir my big pot of soup.
The Techno Gods Must be Crazy
I am caught in the frustration of technology, banging my head against the wall, unable to move forward or backwards. I keep wondering what I have I gotten myself into and why can’t I seem to gain control of it. Why is it, our worlds are beginning to exist and rely so heavily on technology? When a few minor changes can affect your whole mode of operation and shut you down for days. For most of us it’s beyond our comprehension as to how it functions and we don’t even know how to approach the solution. Granted, it gets better each day, but still the simplest things can become major roadblocks that seem insurmountable and can consume hours and days of your time. I have a great respect and diligently try to understand the world that surrounds me and within which I exist. I have been learning this Joomla program for 6 weeks now working on this new site. It’s brilliant the way it functions and the concept of how you interact with it. It very simple, this is why I have chose it. It looks incredible. We have been building the galleries and are beginning to fine tune it. I now know this program inside and out, and can make the navigation through it quickly but for some reason, things have been reset beyond our perimeters and have suddenly brought the whole project to a halt and have made it non functional today. It doesn’t seem to be the site at all or within the site, but the server or person who controls the server who is making adjustments or changes that impact its functionality. Do I try to find a new server and begin again? We have about 800 pages built, is it possible to transfer all the work we have done? Do we have to just chalk up what we have done to a bad learning experience and move on? Or do we just try to muddle our way through the process and see if it can somehow become resolved? Yes, I know it’s time to take a deep breath, put the gun down and step away from it. It’s all just a matter of wading our way through the process. Looking back, I began this year the very first week of this project with a hard drive meltdown on my laptop and I cursed the techno gods, then there was the midyear crisis of being deactivated from Facebook for a week. I did overcome it. As I know I will overcome this too, but damn it’s sure frustrating being helpless in a vast world that rules our existence.
OUTSpoken
Last night I had dinner with an old friend that I have known for years. He is a young kid, originally from California who came to Montana to go to the University. He is a very successful independent business man at the age of 35 who has always been a role model and inspiration to me. About twelve years ago, when I was first getting into photography, we and a few other people started a venture together, to build a stronger gay community in our small city of Missoula. It seemed the time was ripe and I had been a part of creating a men’s focus group to identify and build a stronger healthier way to look at ourselves using federal prevention money from the Ryan White Act. Coming out of this group I saw a need for unity and to somehow obliterate the isolation and lack of communication that kept us hidden and closeted.
This small band of friends began a monthly newspaper called OUTSpoken, where we would take on a topic that we felt needed to be tackled and devote an entire issue to show the subject from many different perspectives, and of course I would have to come up with the cover photo that captured the essence of the topic. These topics ranged from gay bashing, to intimacy issues, to local politics. One of my favorite subjects was people dealing with transgender issues. It was something I didn’t know anything about and became enamored with as we interviewed others going through this process. To me it was a high point in my life. We became very connected socially with the community and began to develop a very strong network of supporters. The project seem to grow as did we and the community began to thrive, suddenly people were engaging on so many levels and the birth of the idea of a community center was spawned and eventually came into being.
We began to reminisce last night about what leaders we had become in developing and impacting our own little isolated corner of the world and how that world has changed and evolved since our endeavor. I think so many people in small towns still feel a bit trapped or isolated and I can’t tell if the internet is helping or hindering this. The skill that we lack is an ability to talk to each other, there is a confidence missing to put ourselves out there for fear of being judged or some other retribution. From what I can see the internet makes it easier to hook up, remain anonymous, without having to engage someone socially. It’s kind of like that person you sit next to on an airplane that you don’t talk to because you know it seems pointless when you are headed for different destinations and your paths may never cross again.
I began to realize last night this is one of the goals I set out at the beginning of this year and writing about my experience, because it is deeply impacting others. People can learn and grow from the lessons I have learned. This year has been one of the greatest years of my own personal growth. I now see how I have made amends with my own family issues, my identity of coming to terms with my own aging process, and finding the vitality in the life that surrounds me. Sometimes we become so caught up in our own worlds that we forget or become blinded to the relevance and significance of our own remarkable beauty. I began to year feeling hopeless and at the end of my rope and now that passion is again ignited and reborn. Wow what an awesome year I am having!
