This is one photograph in a series by Jenny Saville and Glen Luchford called Closed Contact. Jenny is a painter and the model for all the photographs that challenge society's standard of beauty. Glen is the photographer with a history in fashion. All of the photographs have been transferred onto plexiglass... so these photos of flesh pressed against glass actually have an element of realism about them when you see them in person.
It's hard to know where to begin in my feelings when I look at this because it all hits me at once. There is an element of love, the hands pressing into the folds of flesh, embracing the rounds and hallows, the intimacy of the hand on the breast, to be so comfortable with yourself that you can hold yourself... and an element of hatred, the lower hand gripping a roll, the flesh smashed in such a way against the glass that you can't quite tell what you're looking at, the aggressive angle of the nipple (such a delicate and sensitive part of the body), that implies a reckless disregard or even loathing of ones own body. The vulnerability of naked flesh, exposed and yet partially covered by embarressed hands, or hands that may actually be framing it... inviting you to look. The challenge of "Mine", holding onto itself, fighting against your judgement... and yet the exposure, inviting you to look, make your own assessment. And then with the lighting, it's warm, pink, soft. Real. But it's almost like looking at a specimen in a jar, one part of a whole you'll never see or understand. It's almost gruesome in its vulnerability... And yet strangely beautiful.
The hands are almost masculine, and even though I know they are her own hands, I could imagine them being a man's hands both embracing her and punishing her. A sort of commentary on the desire to be desired and never quite measuring up... My own insecurities fighting with a man's attraction.
If you look at it for long enough, you begin to distance yourself from it... it stops looking real. This is not an image we see in the media. This is not something you even see from your friends. This is only something you see when you are naked in your own room, loving or hating the way you look. No one exposes themselves like this... and therefore its foreign. Can you let yourself embrace something that hasn't been normalized? Can you let yourself find beauty in it when deep down you can't even look at your own body like this?
I love it. I truly love this. I want it hanging in my living room... but I have to ask myself... if this were me, would I see it the same way? Would I love it as much? Would I want to hang this photo on the wall if I knew that body was my body? Could I expose myself and my vulnerabilities and hang it like art on the wall for everyone to see?
Love myself, hate myself, embrace my curves, curse them. Want to change. Want to stay the same. Want love. Want desire. Want to be enough... Feeling impossibly feminine and totally foreign. Is this my body or is it the body I am trapped inside of?
Truly moving work.
If you would like to see the rest, here is a link to the gallery's web page.
https://www.gagosian.com/exhibitions/january-12-2002--jenny-saville--glen-luchford/exhibition-images
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