Julian Hans - 'Dieux du Stade'

Having recently strayed and cheated on the divine blonds (you remember my 'Fetish for Latins' post), I was snapped back to reality, browsing through the 'Dieux de Stade' 2005 calendar, a mostly nude photographic essay of the French rugby team.

My shame was made most acute by the luminous trancendant beauty of Julian Hans (below).

























He doesn't get ya cock immediately hard and throbbing and dribbling pre-cum. I think it's cos he's an example of the first half of the old dichotomy of sacred and profane love. You just want to kiss him - a lot. And cuddle ... and eventually you might blow.





But the pic of his massive firm butt and thighs (no jelly - he probably plays the game a squillion hours a week) does in fact get some action happening between my legs. I guess I am only speaking for myself here. Or maybe not - what do you think?

Robert Maplethorpe - Photography and the Gay Sensibility

I was looking through a book of Robert Maplethorpe's photographs today and reminded of just how beautiful the compositions were, on an immediate sensory level. Whatever the content, there is the same elegance and balance in design, the dramatic use of light and shadow, and the clarity and precision of composition. These pervasive qualities give the family resemblance of a really individual vision. And what really gets me in, that gay sensibility that turns on my gaydar, full.

BUT, I've also have this nagging suspicion of these formal qualities being a bit self-consciously managed. Are the photos too glossy and slick? Is the symmetry too obvious? There is a sense of great advertising design. High-lighted by them harking back to a by-gone era: 'Vanity Fair' or 'Life Magagine' of the 50's and 60's. Of course, this is also the point.

There are the still lives:


And the 'society portraits':


Love Louise Bourgeois (French-born American Abstract Expressionist Sculptor) looking a tad bemused by that BIG BIG COCK and BALLS breakfast (a baguette).

And of course there are the hot blokes:








And those where you do a double-take:

And finally the ones that 'scare the horses' - that got everyone (well, maybe not everyone) so uptight at that New York show:

Ross Watson

Ross Watson, a Sydney-based painter, works in a super-realist style. He' s gay and (maintaining the theme of 'Vintage Cuties: Jo Dallesandro, Perseus and Doryphorus'), often draws on well-known masterpieces, but includes present images. The three following pairs show Ross's painting and then the sources: works by Friedrich (1835), Titian (1520) and Christus (1470).

























































The first Watson painting includes Paul Licuria, a less-than-unattractive Collingwood football player:













These works are pretty-much in the 'one-handed' look category, rather than serious art.

Now comes the bit that set me off putting this down about mixed works. At a Sydney exhibition opening, Ross indicated I could commission a work from him - with myself included in the painting! My mind began to boggle with the possibilities. But I was deflated somewhat when he indicated the design must be wholly his. But of course, I went on to fantasize possibilities, becoming my own artist in the process:










Maybe the obvious structural discontinuity (not to say impossibility) between my own head and Michaelangelo's neck gives the new work a certain charm? Though perhaps my skills with Photoshop are not quite up to the great task?!

However I must say, conceptually (and so aesthetically, spiritually, cosmically ... :>>), I have moved way way beyond Ross in that my past and present images are so ingeniously integrated (a big fat belly laugh must be inserted here). Do you think he is quivering in his boots? And wondering where the hell his stuff will go to now on?

Go on - what are your fantasises in this mode? Michaelangelo's 'David' with your dignified and classic face staring meaningfully into the distance? Leoarndo's 'Mona Lisa' with that enigmatic smile of yours slithering across her face? You know 'that smile' - the one you put on as you are about to sidle up to a cute bloke at your usual gay venue on Saturday night.

Anyway, I am sure you can imagine the following 'classic' guys with my face (or yours). Or not!!!

Magazines for the Gay Sensibility

I guess since nearly the beginnings of photography in the 1830's, there have been images for the gay sensibility, like this mid-late C19 pic:



These guys are so serious about their explorations - as though undertaking some great medical discovery. Crabs? Or it is a kind of simian grooming behaviour? Any ideas?

But for those who needed their stimulus in a somewhat disguised form ('no judgement' - Carrie, 'Sex in the City'), hot guys could be dressed up in a classical mode, even directly mimicking culturally approved works. A pair of examples would be:














This subterfuge afforded the greatest safety, in case, for example, Great Aunt Maude should happen into the library when you were appraising the 'art'. Of course, there was always the problem of explaining ya pants being round ya ankles and ya red sweaty face, to say nothing of the roaring hard-on in ya other hand. Come to think of it, can't image any kind of excuse that would work in this case, and I'm pretty inventive. Any ideas?

Photo-heavy magazines this century, ever more mindful of wresting that extra poofta buck, have offered us the images we want, and for those needed the disguise, the guys came as body-builders, weight-losers, nudists, whatever. Like that super cute bloke I posted on Saturday 'Diary Bit - 'Vintage Nanosecond' '. And this 1941Chinese example:



Did anyone actually believe that body-builders/weight-loosers/nudists bought this stuff?

The magazines I really like are those where the disguise is almost abandoned. They are one (infinitesimally small) degree away from being just a Fag Mag, particularly with names like 'Adonis' and 'Demi-Gods'. That degree is getting the trunks down and the cock up:

A Spring Revelation

I was thinking about everyone confessing in their blogs of being a bit/very frisky, now it's spring in Sydney.

And interested that, in this state, some were having great success. 'RYAN' has been kissing boys in parks.

And others were not. 'Paul-up-Late' sadly mused on this - though I quickly explained it was cos he was so raging red hot that people were much too nervous to approach him.

Anyway, as I was out walking with a friend and his dog in the park this afternoon, it occurred to me why the second group wasn't having any success. It was there right in our faces. Couldn't believe I'd never thought of it!

So for 'the alone' and unsexed with good reason (me maybe, not you Paul!), I have the answer:





































But, if this guy is not to your taste, just fill in the appropriate image.

But a warning. This technique won't work:





































This pick-up technique works well, even if the other guy doesn't have a dog.

But it's better if you both do. The dogs get together, sniff each other and whatever. And then you get round to doing the same, usually a bit later! Though doing it in parks is not unheard of!