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sexypinkon · 9 months

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Eden's Apple - Interpretation and ire in the works of Stuart Hahn

Medulla Art Gallery featured a talk with the Artist Stuart Hahn on Wednesday eight August twenty twenty-three. It started tentatively and ended boisterously with interviewer Natasha Ramnauth steering the conversation into territory raised by a guest about the carnivalesque. That was provoking enough, but there was a much more niggling issue that caught my attention as Mr Hahn spoke about his work.

As an avid admirer of his prolific collections over the decades I was alerted when yet again I heard him mention that he could not show nudity in public. At prior shows he had said those exact words to the audience.

Stuart Hahn - The Fall of Man

In Jamaica,the Laura Facey bronze sculpture Redemption Song is met with all the respect it deserves in a declared homophonic island. No one is deeming the public work indecent or homocentric. I found myself wondering why and how Mr Hahn has been dealing with this no man’s land quite literally for so many decades?

What does Mr Hahn have to be apologizing and hiding for? Is Stuart Hahn a maverick where nudity and male at that is concerned?

The short answer is no.

Stuart Hahn - The Fall of Man

He is preceded by the likes of Boscoe Holder and Hugh Stollmeyer. It is curious, but not fully necessary to know that those names represent men who were homosexual or bisexual. This is to be included only because of the fact that sexual history has been hard fought particularly in ultra religious spaces like Trinidad and Tobago.

Is Mr Hahn exploiting the form by showing explicit sexual acts? No.

In fact Mr Hahn only uses naked imagery in contexts where they are called for.

But instead of being caught up with his exceptional skills as a draftsman of the anatomy it is easy for the media to continue to hound his use of drawing what I can only call the subversive penis. Vaginas and breasts hold neutral ground.

Meanwhile it seems that the erect, semi-erect and inert penis causes great consternation.

We all reel daily as we read and hear of barbarically cruel murders. Yet, the penis in art is being ‘held’ as too unpalatable for sensitive constitutions.

Is there a connection between crime and the male body?

This may be an absurd question, but Mr Hahn’s work and legacy might hinge on the fact that a sense of being out of touch with the body is an important marker for all of us. An automatic fear or distaste to observe classical art in a caribbeanesque context narrows the lens.

Mr Hahn was born in Nevis of a St. Kittitian mother and Trinbagonian father. Of Caucasian heritage in a mostly brown land, a child of colonialism in San Fernando and a gay man in the Caribbean space during Black Power and Oil Money is dizzying enough. It makes one want to tear off one’s skin.

Nudity and the drawing of skin titillates. It is peeling back layers and finding oneself in private territory. Art has lauded nakedness for centuries, so, to now grapple on an island with what it means - is curious to me particularly when a few years ago Trinidad and Tobago was given the dubious honor of being in the top ten of users of porn sites in the world.

Stuart Hahn - The Murder of Abel

Mr Hahn’s Biblical, Classical Literature, Indian Mythology and local Folkloric pieces do far more than occasionally dabble in nudity. By focusing on the trite, everything that his work demonstrates gets shunted to the side. Mr Hahn’s work connects the complex past with the continuously confusing present. He shows great discipline when drawing and rendering the form with prisma color pencils and pen and ink when paint is so much faster - his almost religious penitence in lauding his characters with wings, togas and ropes of hair - yes there is homo eroticism in the work.

However, homo simply means man. I will not go down the prickly path of Adam and Eve not Adam and Steve. I also will not convince anyone of changing their sensitivities or sensibilities. I write to place Mr Hahn’s work where it needs to be. He is neither a pornographer nor a sensationalist.

That is so clear in societies great love of Derek Walcott's TiJean and his Brothers the children’s book and his innovative approach to the Black Madonna and Child way before it was fashionable to do so. As a white, Caribbean gay man making Art in Trinidad and Tobago and causing debate makes Stuart Hahn’s career an important marker in Art history - one that we all take for granted. We speak fluidly about Impressionism or Abstraction. But what of Stuart Hahn’s drawings? I suggest that as we look at Art in Trinidad and Tobago, we begin to observe what is before our very own eyes:that we respect and honor ours in the same way that we have finally given Pan the attention deserved.

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spicymochi · 1 month

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semiaquatic secret agent

#perry the platypus #platypus #phineas and ferb #artists on tumblr #digital art #digital illustration #illustration #drawing #my art #art #artwork #cute #kawaii #animals #animal art #illust #soft art #fanart

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ra3kiv · 3 months

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sea, swallow me

#my art #art #digital art #original character #digital drawing #oc #original character art #ocean #sea #artwork #artists on tumblr #art tag #illustration

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feefal · 4 months

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#funguary day 1, Mycena subcyanocephala! Or Blue Bonnet mushroom. A newly discovered mushroom from Taiwan - it’s only been seen about 8 times.

#funguary #funguary2024 #drawing #artists on tumblr #illustration #digital art #procreate

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storieldraw · 5 months

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💥✨️

#drawing #sketch #animal #illustration #digital #art #artists on tumblr #artwork #painting

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christopher-ratto · 6 days

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So I started watching dungeon meshi...

#illustration #artists on tumblr #artwork #drawing #tumblr draw #tumblr illustration #fantasy art #dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #dungeon meshi fanart #falin touden #falin dungeon meshi #dungeon meshi falin #delicious in dungeon fanart #delicious in dungeon falin

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shurinpat · 2 months

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boops you

#boop!#my art <3 #patches #patches fanart #dreamblr #dreamwastaken #dream fanart #cat art #cat doodle #doodle #digital art #drawing #digital illustration #cats #artists on tumblr

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koitosoup · 1 month

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Laios, devourer of all things horrible.

#dungeon meshi spoilers #ref: Sir Galahad by Goerge Frederic Watts #dungeon meshi #dunmeshi #laios touden #dungeon meshi fanart #laios touden fanart #artists on tumblr #art #drawing #digital art #fanart #painting #illustration

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jramseyi · 3 months

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Glowing Goldfish at Dusk

#digital art #artists on tumblr #art #illustration #animal art #cats #cat art #fish #goldfish #cute art #original art #drawing #cat

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nikoco11 · 8 days

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there is something horrifically grim to it, but illustrations for gaza and palestinians tend to catch more mass attention that actual photos of people. this made me feel incredibly helpless for a long while, seeing both how people would rather look at a neat drawing of red black green and white than look a human in the eyes, and how online platforms would rather push a viral drawing while suppressing those begging for help at the same time.

a way to cope with this feeling has been taking advantage of it to directly guide people to helping palestinians.

if art gets better traction, then there’s an incredible amount of good that can be done by creating art that immediately links to fundraisers. creating art of the many images of those who are asking for help.

within hours of posting my drawing, there has been jumps in the thousands for bashar from gaza’s fundraiser. it’s a small effort in the grand scheme of things. it’s not a fix it. but it’s something good. please take care of each other and do what you can. i think this could help a lot of people if a lot of people did it.

here is bashar. i’ve drawn him, spoken to him, and known him now for a few months. any shares help, any art helps. draw who you see, draw what you see. thanks all