Tania Hammidi – artcritical

Tom of Finland: Rough

Tania Hammidi — Fri, 01 Sep 2006 16:08:20 +0000

Western Project

3830 Main Street

Culver City, California 90232

310-838-0609

www.western-project.com

July 29–September 9, 2006

Installation shot, Western Project (2006)

Tom of Finland invites an intimate, comedic gaze. If there were two keys words for his work, they would be “freedom” and “narrative,” rather than “hot” and “hunky” as some might hazard. True, the topics of a Finland portrait are very sexual, but as the artist’s choice to adopt the pseudonym “Tom of Finland” in late 1956 (the name accompanied his artwork submission to Physique Pictorial, which wowed the editor and earned “Tom of Finland” the magazine’s Spring 1957 cover) suggests, Touko Laaksonen understood that his work expressed an abandon that was not sanctioned by the homophobic, prudent regimes of his time.

TOM OF FINLAND: Rough presents 130 preliminary sketches, notebooks, and master drawings from 1928 -1989. The exhibit revolves conceptually around a vitrine in the middle of the main gallery space: an archival display of Finland’s drawing tools, including a sketchbook heaving with images of men, leather and military wear, and Finland’s hand-drawn “adjustments” to newspaper photographs. From this center point, close viewing of archival materials is paired with – and challenged by – gallery director Cliff Benjamin’s large scale monochrome murals of Finland pieces on each wall. The murals resemble Finland’s work convincingly, achieved through overhead projection and tracing in acrylic paint. What these murals evidence is not only the “larger-than-life” status of Finland’s work within gay, leather, kink, and factions of the art world, but also the microcosmic marks of his pen and pencil works, only blown up 400%. That the murals successfully translate the narratives of sexual splendor and social freedom communicated in their original size attests to Finland’s graphic power.

Again, perspectives on intimacy and abandon are explored in the exhibition’s layering of original Finland pieces over these murals, such that the corporeal experience of viewing and grasping so much sex at once – much like the orgies Finland depicts in his sketches, and master drawings, differently – leaves one, as perhaps it should, in a tizzy. How close or how far? To witness the evenness of a Finland line, or to marvel at cock sizes and their many sexual gestures? These are some of the questions which Rough raises.

With the murals, this exhibition dips into a historical imaginary, in a way that recalls the 1998 “Queer and Kinky Danger: Art of San Francisco’s Leather/SM/Kink Worlds” where wall-sized illustrated panels rescued from the Bulldog Baths (a late 70’s Folsom Street club) rested against archive/gallery walls.

Tom of Finland, page from his childhood notebook (1928) pencil on paper, Collection Tom of Finland Foundation

In Finland’s childhood notebook, from age 7, we witness a youthful attention to brotherhood and themes of labor and masculinity. In a page from his childhood notebook (1928) on view in an entryway vitrine, a hand-drawn comic with watercolor describes a firefighting scene, where women and children are compartmentalized – and separated – by comic cells and boxed-in subplots. Here, Finland is learning the trade of telling stories visually, tapping into gender-appropriate boyhood joys: firemen, police teams, trucks, comic books. The themes of homosociality and men – which rarely leave a Finland frame – are evident in these early drawings, as is his sense of humor. What is remarkable about these early pieces is his focus on memory, expressed in one cell where the child’s thematic concerns are trumped by his detailed attention to depict a house roof. Rather than representing a roof by an upside-down V, suggestive of efficiency and schematization, the young man draws out systematic and evenly-spaced rafters and ceiling joists. As his parents were both school-teachers (and not carpenters), the focus and visual breadth of this cell expresses the enhanced role draftsmanship is already playing in his developing creativity. Conceptually, perhaps the rafters and ceiling joists are indicative of the “underground,” supporting community he will later find.

While Canadian artist G.B. Jones, who has been called “the female Tom of Finland,” shifted Finland’s terms of fantasy and iconographic masculinity into overtly political themes of irony, Rough evidences a different shift through its massive exhibition of preliminary sketches. An early portrait sketch (whose production overlaps with Finland’s service in the Finnish Army as a lieutenant for the duration of WWII,1939-1945) such as Untitled (1944) toys with the scene of an anonymous blow job. In the sketch, Finland completes the frame, demeanor, and (especially) hairstyle and jacket folds of the top, while only a head and cap (pulled over the face) of the bottom, blowing and fully engulfed, are rendered. Though gallery director Benjamin suggests no sure trace between preliminary and master drawings with any of the studies on display, it is possible that Untitled (1946) grew out of Finland’s conception of anonymity. In the 1946 work, Finland draws out class distinctions and relations of power more thoroughly: colorizing the scene, revealing the face of the man blowing (his cap, which once shielded his eyes, now dons the head of the “top”), and adding a third player to the scene: a set of restraining hands, putting the status of the “top” in question.

This character joins a larger sex party in 1968 in Preliminary study for “The Rope” where he is finally placed in a geography (the forest), described from the front, and shares more fluid relations of power.

Tom of Finland, Untitled (1963). Graphite on paper, 11-1/2 x 8-3/16 inches

Many of the preliminary sketches throughout Finland’s career emphasize formal issues of framing, figural composition, and perspective (a voyeuristic one) over volumetric depth. In other words, one grasps what seems to be a Finland process in these preliminary sketches: that the first order of business in a Finland composition is figural scale and physical orientation, so that Finland’s own presence as voyeur is established; second, Finland sets these scenarios of desire into three dimensions by playing out the depth of field and background details. Sketches up to the mid-1960’s show experimentation with the dimensions and proportions of archetypical hypermasculinity, where such things as nipples, pectoral muscles, erections, testis, and buttocks are drawn and shadowed with an ever-increasing sense of nuance.

The direction of these experiments is suggested by his 1971 comic series Jack 1: The White Hunter. This rescue story, exhibited here for the first time, takes on colonial archetypes (Tarzan and the White Hunter) and queries the nature of their masculinity, through Finland’s stark color contrasts brought on by pen and ink on paper. His choice of materials moves his master drawings out of a graphite art historical tradition, and into the mechanical age and popular press. Perhaps what is lovely about this comic series is its remove from the (by now) traditional terrain of sado-masochism into a much more domestic realm.

The provocative and explicit nature of Finland’s work in relation to his tenure as an officer (read: power relations) in WWII (read: German soldiers; specific military costumes) poses an interesting question to us in our own late 21st century military culture. Namely, with the homosociality which military duty demands (and offers) of young men and women just over 18 years old, ripe in their own sexual developments and explorations, will Tom of Finland have a successor?

Western Project3830 Main StreetCulver City, California 90232310-838-0609 www.western-project.com

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Tom Otterness in Beverly Hills

Tania Hammidi — Sat, 01 Apr 2006 19:07:31 +0000

Beverly Hills City Hall
450 N. Crescent Dr.
Beverly Hills, Ca. 90210
(310) 550-4796

November 15, 2005 – April 30, 2006

Tom Otterness, Big, Big Penny, 1993. Bronze, edition of 3, 71-¼ x 65 x 13 inches. Courtesy the Artist

Tom Otterness apparently heard that people like money in Beverly Hills. Indeed, his eight sculptures on display on the west lawn of Beverly Hills City Hall tell a story about entrepreneurship, American justice, and money.

Otterness makes celebratory, but “gently” critical visual statements, whose subversiveness lies in their uncanny references to 1950’s figurative cartoons and intricate narratives about family structures. Otterness’ populism makes his work palatable to a wide range of on-lookers. Though there is no “Goofy” or “Daffy” or “Minnie Mouse” to be found on the lawn, the works are as goofy, daffy, and mini (the smallest figures are three inches high) as their Disney counterparts. Indeed, seeing Otterness’ work in Los Angeles — the same geography that inspired the makers of Disney characters and animation — lends a special nostalgic hue to these glimmering, if not weathered, ocular treasures.

Formally, the work harmonizes with the trees and Mission-style architecture of City Hall. The work entertains us as much as it inspires contemplation. Pieces are spread out spaciously on both flanks of the lawn, are centered on the cement path leading to the front entrance of City Hall, and run alongside Santa Monica Blvd and Crescent Drive. The work can be accessed easily by walkers or drivers; many of the pieces reach 25’ high, and some are almost as wide. Of course the best way to take in this outdoor exhibit is slowly, and the placard map (such as this one http://www.tomostudio.com/) is stationed appropriately slightly off-center. The work is not abstract. Each Otterness piece seems to smile, both on the inside (conceptually) and on the outside (pictorally), with the exception of those figures whose faces have been covered with money bags, such as King and Queen (1997). And while the Tree of Knowledge (1997), stationed directly below the front cement stairs leading into City Hall, does provide a harsh critique (one figure holds a dagger), it seems that the dancing glee of Free Money (2001) really describes Otterness’ overall sentiment.

Otterness’ sculptures provide sartorial cues: aristocrats wear top hats, vested suits, long gowns, and beaded necklaces, for example. Yet the subject of money, especially since Warhol’s silkscreens of money, holds a peculiar place in American art, even sculpture. The bulbous money bags (which double as heads, and shadow the King and Queen with an uncanny image of harm) lend themselves perfectly to the material used. It seems that any ironic critique of capitalism suggested by these groupings is outweighed by the jolly rotundity and pleasant plumpness of the figures.

Tom Otterness, Free Money, 2001. Bronze, edition of 3, 107-1/2 x 69-1/2 x 84 inches. Courtesy the Artist

In light of that, what I found most delightful about Otterness’ work is the commentary about labor in each piece. The labor of the artist is clearly part of the celebration: each piece demonstrates mastery over the process, so much so that the green patina from its stay in LA poses no threat to the success of the work. Likewise, Otterness’ Big Big Penny seems to replicate at 71 inches high (about 7’) the same financial statement that the US penny does in a ½ diameter. His attention to the shallow depths and fine surface details, do not offset the fine balancing of this circular form.

But there is an even more interesting phenomena going on in Otterness’ installation with regards to gender, and possibly sexuality. For who is driving the Large Covered Wagon but a pipe-smoking woman and her friendly, clothed ox? What are the children in the back of the wagon doing but fighting in the rear orifice of the covered wagon, in thick fluid motions made of childhood trauma? These details in the narratives of Tom Otterness’ sculpture tell the viewer a lot about the development of industry and greed, more than the panoramic eye can grasp. Indeed, behind Big Big Penny one finds two small figures, men kissing. And true to the form, the working class men are symbolized by hard-hats and given only the shirts on their backs, no pantaloons, exposing the remaining anatomy without fanfare. Present in the smallest of details, there is subtle sensuality in Otterness work that complicates the normative family structures implied by the cartoon themes.

Tania Hammidi is a graduate student of Dance History and Theory at the University of California, Riverside. She works on contemporary visual art and movement, with particular attention to sculpture and language.

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