Nourishing, You Say
Or, Display Purposes Only.
Presumably, the statue above, which resembles its sculptor Aske Kreilgaard and is described by the museum as a “nourishing man,” and which was originally created to celebrate International Men’s Day, is meant to have some symbolic value. A message of sorts.
The decision to adorn what was once the Women’s Museum with a, shall we say, transitioning figure, this “nourishing man,” is likely an attempt to comply with prevailing fashions regarding those individuals who are somewhat at odds with their physical selves. A trans-friendly gesture. Or, as the museum puts it, somewhat coyly, a sign of “gender inclusivity.”
It occurs to me, however, that a man being given large doses of cross-sex hormones and subsequently developing facsimile breasts isn’t going to lactate anything remotely nourishing for a child. Given sufficiently high doses of female hormones, and given sufficiently zealous pumping, some men can be made to secrete a substance from their nipples, albeit unreliably and in very limited quantities – but the resulting discharge is of no nutritional value to an infant.
As Dr Maja Bowen notes here,
Given that the statue is apparently intended as both fashionable and symbolic, and a nod to the sexually dysmorphic, then an obvious reading of that gesture, rendered in stone, is that the actual feeding of the infant is of no great consequence. At best, a secondary concern. Sort of, Screw the hungry baby. Let’s focus on affirming the dysmorphic man. And which, it has to be said, is an odd message to send.
The ladies at Reduxx also have some thoughts.
Update, via the comments, from transgender Reddit:
Note the word successfully. To which, one might ask, for whom?
Rope sculpture: the sculptor’s assistants refused to touch it for fear of breakage.
First of all, Ben David, shalom aleichem. In fine “Jewish geography” style, where are you from? (I’m from Crown Heights.)
So about your comment – I don’t know; if that is supposed to be circumcised, it looks more to me like the incomplete kind described in the Mishnah, Shabbat 19:6. Not that I’m going to look any closer to verify, though.
I’d also be surprised if it is, since if it’s supposed to be a depiction of the (f)artist, why then AFAIK outside of the USA it’s pretty uncommon for boys to be circumcised unless they’re Jewish or Muslim (though famously Elizabeth II had it done for her boys).
After sixteen years of doing this, I can still be surprised by where the comment threads go.
That’s because a number of us women, who would never have joined forces with feminists in the past, are now being compelled to do so in this culture war.
Bezmenov tried to warn you.
The entire point here is the transgression.
If you don’t have anything to say, or have no talent, or are just depraved, then be transgressive!
Is there even a bourgeoisie left to épater?
Think I’ll just leave this here.
Until fairly recently, I wouldn’t have expected to find much common cause with self-styled feminists. However, current political fashions – which amount to a war on reality, on probity, and on one’s ability to say, “Actually, two plus two does not equal nine” – have shaken things up a bit. And so, strange bedfellows.
As I said in the thread linked above,
And compelled dishonesty is very much at the heart of the issue.
I was wondering quite how to take this statue; what mode it ought to be interpreted in.
We’re accustomed to over a century now of surrealist art where one might find all manner of items mixed up – objects not doing what they ought to (think Dali’s melting clocks), hands where there shouldn’t be hands, breasts where there shouldn’t be breasts. You name it.
But it’s not surrealism.
Nor is it realism – notwithstanding the few cases of bearded women, etc.
Nor science fiction art.
It’s framed as a ‘provocation’, partly – but one gets the impression it’s not meant as that at all. It’s a portrayal of the belief that men can be women and women can be men, and that men *can* breastfeed.
That mixture of odd, heterogeneous elements all mixed up and sincere belief reminds me of nothing so much as the old pagan Gods.
Somewhat related.
Well, a lot of artists are crazy. Dali is merely a more flamboyant example.