The Art of Advertising (Again)

Today the opposite of tomato is 'shaking that ass'


graphite & putty eraser/30x20cm
oroginal source: 'Daily Telegraph' 19/09/08

The original newspaper photograph from which this drawing was processed references the popular tradition of the 'Venus' of art history: the female nude in opulent, sensual surroundings, recumbent upon a sumptuously upholstered bed, plump silk pillows & cushions, the chiaroscuro lighting. As the image in its original context serves to illustrate a product advertisement, this quotation confers upon the marketing campaign a sense of this tradition & thus a patina of 'high cultural' authority & respectibility: otherwise, the whole, its combination of visual symbolism (including the pomegranates - split open, the glistening seeds of their interiors available & offered - signifying fertility & abundance as might the model's form) & text, is a frankly sexual 'hard sell', an advertisement of & appeal to sexuality & sexual desire, a naked invitation to buy a product & thus into the improved, idealized, desirable lifestyle it suggests (none-too-subtly) it promotes.

Coincidentally, the newspaper ad appeared & thus the drawing was subsequently inspired & made just prior to the BBC4 rebroadcasting of John Berger's 1970s TV series 'Ways of Seeing' (the book of the same title being an art college staple text), during the course of which the relationship between the tradition of the fine art of European oil painting & contemporary advertising is subjected to rigorous critical scrutiny: the situation remains the same, albeit we live in more explicit times now, 35 years on, & the veneer of sophistication with which advertising coats & attempts to mask its fundamental, naked aim has worn thinner still. However, for all the banal crassness of the original context, the image proved most seductive in terms of processing as a tonal study of form - a tribute, perhaps to its art historical source.

The focus of the image (&, incidentally, the accompanying text) brought vividly to mind such nudes from art history as Velasquez's so-called 'Rokeby' Venus & another of Boucher's. I recall fondly how the Rokeby Venus was a particular favourite & object of desire of a college art history professor & also, during the course of another TV programme, was referred to as "the most smackable arse in the history of art"...


Velasquez 'The Toilet of Venus'
oil on canvas/1647 - 51


Boucher 'Girl Reclining (Marie-Louise O'Murphy)'
oil on canvas/1752

A particular signifier of just how compelling the 'Rokeby' Venus remains can be found at the Velasquez Venus Project, a fascinating attempt by the painter Joseph Dawson to create his own personal take on the theme of the Venus With a Mirror, which blog charts his progress from conception to completion of his transcription & the resulting image.