Olympia By Everyone: April 2013

About This Project:

This blog is under construction, but click here to see what it's about: Olympia By Everyone

This is a participatory photo project--watch this blog for new posings!

Your Participation is Requested! Join the fun: I am staging the Olympia painting, and invite people to pose as characters in the painting. I then photograph or film the participants.

Please contact me at: {artistabain at yahoo dot com}, 415-789-7299 if you would like to participate. You can act as any of the characters: Olympia the courtesan (prostitute), the Servant (whose name I wish I knew), and the Black Cat. This is a collaboration with you, so I am interested in your ideas of roles, meaning, etc. For example, one person wants to be the cat; another wants to put body tape on her chest to re-shape herself to look more like Olympia. I am interested in your ideas.

If you don't want to pose nude, I have several body suits available to wear, and props are available for you to use to adjust your gender, if you like. I have a costume for the Servant available, or you may have an idea for other costumes. Through the magic of trick photography, you can even play all the roles in the painting.

Keep in mind that the original painting has layers of significance and meaning: the model was herself a painter namedVictorine Meurant. I am searching for images of her paintings; she showed in the Paris Salon, too. She modeled for several of Manet's paintings, including the scandalous "Picnic in the Grass/Dejuener sur l'Herbe." The painting is full of race, class, and gender issues that can resonate in the 21st century just as well as they did in the late 1800s when Manet presented the painting.

Of course, meaning is in the eye of the beholder, so people have many interpretations. of art. I look forward to seeing what you come up with. No need to over-think it: whatever you feel like is fine.

Olympia By Everyone

Friday, April 12, 2013

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