Transgression and Taste

Transgression

Transgressive art is art that aims to outrage or violate basic morals and sensibilities. It aims to portray a 'shock value' that could potentially offend the viewer. But in most examples, artists choose a topic they want to portray, such as human bodily autonomy, and focus in on one specific aspect that is not commonly highlighted in art, e.g. periods and a tampon.

In this piece (Red Flag, Judy Chicago), she has chosen to highlight the very natural process that half of the worlds population has to deal with. Instead of keeping the process hidden, as many menstruating people have learnt to do through the shame surrounding menstruation that has been ingrained in us from an early age, she has instead she has used this as the focus of her piece. Show the true art and beauty around the menstruating body. 

Through paintings such as 'Red Flag' Chicago 'began to find her voice as a woman', these images evolved into a series called the 'Great Ladies', in which she represented various important women in history. Through this project she discovered the erasure of women's achievements, a finding that world fuel her major work, 'The Dinner Party'.

This focus of the menstruating body then leads me on to another topic, of gender and sexual identity. The idea of only women menstruating does not directly relate to the modern world, with thousands of individuals all over the world not conforming to the standard cis-heteronormative world that society has been molded after. Yes, the majority of people still still identify as cis-heterosexual, but that is not true of everyone. 

There are a few terms that I'd like to clarify before I carry on. Cisgender relates to people who identify as the gender assigned to them at birth. Transgender is an umbrella term used to describe people whos gender is not the same as the gender they were assigned at birth. Non-binary is an umbrella term used for people whos gender doesn't conform to the standard men/women ideology. This all of course lands on a broad spectrum, which often times makes people questioning their gender feel uncomfortable and that they don't 'fit in'.

There is also a biological relationship that we have to be aware of, the common belief that biological gender is completely binary, but that isn't the case. Instead of the two (male and female) we are taught in school biology where males have XY chromosomes and females have XX chromosomes, there are actually six different scientifically different genders. 

X - roughly 1 in 2,000-5,000 people (Turner's)

XX - most common form of female

XXY - roughly 1 in 500-1,000 people (Klinefelter)

XY - most common form of male

XYY - roughly 1 in 1,000 people

XXXY - roughly 1 in 18,000-50,000 people

When you consider that there are roughly 7 billion people on the planet, there 10s of millions of people who are biologically not male or female. This topic is often found in transgressive art, as often times, people need the 'shock factor' to start thinking more about the realities of biological and the individuals true gender. 

Kim Leutwyler

Leutwyler is an American born artist based an Sydney Australia. She works with a variety of media including painting, installation, ceramics, printing and drawing. Her current work focuses on exploring notions of beauty, gender and queer identity and primarily uses paints as its the medium most used in the masculine history in the western art world. 

This is a painting of Melbourne-based musician Shan Watson. Every one of her paintings depicts a specific person and portrays them naturally, and highlights their gender identity. Shan's relationship with gender is constantly fluctuating and identifies as non-binary. They choose to leave their armpit hair untouched, and wear men's boxers. These aspects are highlighted in the painting which I love. It shows how you don't have to conform to societies pre-set gender roles and expectations and you can be free to do what you want with your own body. 

Typical transgressive art often focuses on portraying the 'ugly' side of topics, whether that be showing the privatised aspects of life (think back to 'Red Flag') or highlighting the violence in the meat market. Leutwyler chooses to show these difference between human beings beautifully and 'tastefully'. 

Taste

In art, 'taste' is completely individual. It can't be taught, instead each individual learns their own taste through their life experiences and their preferences. A persons' taste can change over time, and is completely fluid. 

The subject of taste in art, due to its individuality, brings a lot of controversy, often forcing it to be linked to transgression. Taste is usually related to a sense of beauty, such as Leutwyler's work, but beauty is universally experienced, and no two people will have the same idea of beauty. The way I like to describe this is it's the same as attraction. Take a straight man for example. In theory, they have the ability to be attracted to all women, but their taste and idea of beauty can narrow down their choices from say 100 women to 10. It doesn't mean the other 90 women aren't beautiful, it just means that this one particular man, isn't attracted to them. 

One person's taste is highly specific and can change from person to person, but there is often a huge amount of overlap. This then means that (following from the same example) a lesbian women, out of those same 100 women, are attracted to 5 of the same that the man was attracted to, but also another 5 women. They have the overlap, but still their own individual sense of taste. 

This theory can be applied to all aspects of life, including art. What one person loves and is inspired by, another person could be offended by or have no interest in. This is why art is so objective, and why 'transgressive' art is so personal. 

Truly tasteful art therefore (in my opinion) does not exist. There will always be critics, art haters and art lovers. No two people will look at a collection of art and like exactly the same things, and its impossible to create a piece that will be loved by all.