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Camerawork: A Journal of Photographic Arts Spring/Summer 2002, Volume 29, No.1 Everyman: A Search for the Male Form Editor: Diana Gaston Table of Contents • In This Issue $8 each (no discount) [Add to Cart] table of contents 1. In This Issue by Diana Gaston 5. California Dreaming: Mel Roberts’ Boys in the Sand: By Glen Helfand 11. Seeing Eye to I: A Queer Theory By Marisa S. Olson 15. John O’Reilly and the Male Image By Ronald Garrity 22. Portofolio An Anonymous Artist of the Late 20th Century; John Dugdale; Robert Flynt; Bill Jacobson; Bohnchang Koo; Oscar Munoz; John O’Reilly; Dan Ragland; Hugh Shurley; Gerald Slota 36. Exhibition Review Martin Parr: Photographic Work 1971-2000 Barbican Centre, London By Alicia Miller 38. In the Gallery No Exit: Images of Imprisonment 41. Book Review The Book of 101 Books: Seminal Photographic Books of the Twentieth Century By Diana Gaston 43. Books Received and Noted Chuck Mobley in this issue Everyman: A Search for the Male Form The exhibition that inspired this issue of Camerawork was brought to us by guest curator Nora Kabat. The ideas for the exhibition unfolded gradually, over a period of several years, while she quietly stashed away images of the male figure in a file folder. Over time she recognized that a significant number of contemporary photographers were exploring some aspect of the male figure in compelling and unexpected ways. Building on the well-established tenets of feminist theory, she decided to turn the tables on the long tradition of male artists representing female subjects. Her project seeks to turn the gaze back on the male subject, exploring the male figure as presented exclusively by male photographers. The photographic work presented here invites a reassessment of the male figure and a new visual language in which to define the masculine body. Everyman: A Search for the Male Form, as the title suggests, presents the male figure as an emblematic, symbolic form, one that exists as a universal representation of male identity, physicality, and sexuality. The work posits an appropriately complex rendering of the male figure, pushing beyond the tangible structure of the body and into the enigmatic realm of the psyche. Much of the work shown here is dark and brooding, distorted, and edging upon violence. In turn, it is also extremely elegant and refined, seamlessly drawing history and desire into the confines of the image. Rather than attempting the overwhelming task of a full survey of the subject, Everyman explores key facets, through the disparate work of ten photographers: An Anonymous Artist of the 20th Century, John Dugdale, Robert Flynt, Bill Jacobson, Bohnchang Koo, Oscar Muñoz, John O’Reilly, Dan Ragland, Hugh Shurley, and Gerald Slota. Essays here by Marisa S. Olson, Glen Helfand, and Ronald Garrity expand on the issues raised by the exhibition. Olson examines the theoretical complexities of a man photographing another man, revealing the photograph as a form of wish fulfillment. Helfand presents a personal reading of the homoerotic photograph and the shifting critical landscape of image making during the past three decades. Garrity explores the wry and historically layered imagery of photographer John O’Reilly, surveying his photographic practice against the backdrop of feminist theory. And finally, a brief introduction by Nora Kabat provides the curatorial framework for the photographers’ sensuous images presented in the portfolio section. Diana Gaston, editor   home | about | exhibitions | bookstore | events | membership | journal | mentoring | links Copyright 2002. SF Camerawork. All Rights Reserved.