b-loud:Thomas Hodges – Shock or Art

// November 24th, 2009 // View Comments // b-loud

Thomas is a former financial engineer (investment banker) and part-time fashion photographer, who turned full-time photographic artist back in 2002. Award winning and now internationally acclaimed, he is a “mid-career” artist. He founded the art movement “Imaginism” back in December 2006, to embrace his artistic style. Thomas specialises in the art-nude and erotic-nude genres.

He wants his images to capture the beauty of the female form or an architectural monument.  You will see (or not see) as much (or as little) as you desire. The viewer’s imagination is primarily the key to the interpretation of his work.

We think its beautiful stuff – erotic yes – shock not. Thomas explains his philosophy, “Erotic, Erotica, Erotism, Eroticism, etc., all pertain to the root word “Eros”, Son and lover of Aphrodite (or Venus to the Romans), and all pertain to “sexual desire or excitement”. Erotica is (or at least should be) primarily sensual, sensuality being the primary stimulant.  Erotica to me is “sensual stimulation, arousing sexual excitement”. Thomas recently experimented with erotic art and animation. So what do you think – erotic art, art, or visual shock?

We got him to give us a few minutes for our interview.

The b-you interview

b-uncut: What was your first artwork?
Hodges: No idea in honesty, I just can’t remember !  Probably the series “Nude-Shadows”.

b-uncut: your favorite artwork?
Hodges: “Romantica”, it is the perfect example of what my work stands for, i.e. imagination, female sensuality and sexuality.

b-uncut:your most “hated” artwork?
Hodges: I don’t “hate” any of my works, otherwise I would not create them!

b-uncut: What did it take to make it to where you are now?
Hodges: Blood, sweat and tears !

b-uncut: Who has helped you along the way?
Hodges: Many people, but not least of all my wife and muse Chu Chiao Wang.

b-uncut: What are your methods? Your inspirations?
Hodges: My inspirations are all around me, but primarily women and female sexuality, which are my fundamental inspirations.

b-uncut: If I ask you to describe your art, would it be redundant to describe yourself?
Hodges: No, my art and myself are intertwined.  My art is me and I am my art!

The b-quick interview

b-uncut: Favorite swear word?
Hodges: Merde!

b-uncut:  the most seductive human flaw?
Hodges: Vulnerability.

b-uncut:  parental advice you shouldn’t have followed?
Hodges: I didn’t follow any of their advice!

b-uncut: Your least desirable talent?
Hodges: Can’t think of one off-hand!

b-uncut: proud to be hated by.
Hodges: I’d rather be loved by all, hated by none, although that of course I know to be unrealistic!

b-uncut: The question we should never ask?
Hodges: You already have J

The b-where interview

Where do you see yourself in…

5 seconds?……. Still sitting in the Café-Bar typing!

5 minutes?…….. STILL sitting in this Café-Bar typing!!

5 days?……. Rome, maybe London, maybe Paris.

5 months? …….Working on my solo exhibitions and my designs.

5 centuries? ………That’s a few creative lives on

The Shoulda Woulda Coulda Interview

Do we know you: Of course you do J

Should we know you: Of course you should J

Will we know you: Absolutely, without any doubt whatsoever!

A “Whore’s Canal” at the “Nat Gal”

// November 16th, 2009 // View Comments // b-scene

The Hoerengracht (Whore’s Canal) is a dark, intricate, large-scale installation work by US artists Ed Kienholz (1927-94) and his wife Nancy Reddin Kienholz (b1943). The piece, made between 1983 and 1988, has been shown in venues around the world since 1989, and for the first time this year at the National Gallery’s Sunley Room . The walk-through installation, which evokes Amsterdam’s Red Light District through a series of dense assemblages, denotes a perverse patience for detail and dark humor.

So here we are, listening to Roxanne, walking around in a work of art, in the red light district of Amsterdam – thinking many acne-faced teenagers would envy us – taking notes on this dark and detailed vision of men’s lust. To fully understand the almost sinister and shocking dimension of this exhibition, one must keep in mind Kienholz’s purpose when he made it in 1961 – to convey the feelings of the naïve teenager he was when he visited the original, in Nevada, in 1943. It is only then that our sex, blood and drug-numbed minds can see through the old and hard looking whores lying around.

The contrast between the vulgar figures and the homely flowered wallpaper, plump sofas and perky 1943 magazines, is simply disconcerting. In ‘Roxys’, the madam has a boar’s skull; one splay-legged figure is made of a commode and a dustbin that says Love, another lies on a sewing machine base, a yellow rose at her throat and squirrel on her breast.

But how would a 21st century mind interpret this? Did he cross a line? Which line? Is it shocking? Is it art? Is it eroticism?

“Art-nude and erotic-nude” photographer Thomas Hodges gives us his vision on eroticism. Mind the gap!

Hodges: To describe Eroticism, I will take some extracts from the brief article on pornography I wrote some time back.

“Erotic, Erotica, Erotism, Eroticism, etc., all pertain to the root word “Eros”, Son and lover of Aphrodite (or Venus to the Romans), and all pertain to “sexual desire or excitement”. Erotica is (or at least should be) primarily sensual, sensuality being the primary stimulant.” Thus, I would summarise erotica to me as “sensual stimulation, arousing sexual excitement”.

b-uncut: What do you think is the most erotic city?

Hodges: Now this is a difficult one, because I don’t think there is any one single city. However, if I had to choose, I think I would have to say Paris (with Vienna as a close second!).

Why? Well, I guess it’s not so much what can be seen on the surface, it’s more about what innuendoes, and what goes on behind locked doors and in the very active “Club Privé” environment. Check-out this YouTube video to get a feel for what I mean: Art of Seduction: oh la la

b-uncut: Which piece of art (your own or someone else’s) expresses  your idea of eroticism best?

Hodges: Naturally, I would tend to choose my own artwork, although there are plenty of other artists that spring to mind, especially Klimt and Schiele. However, I don’t really have one single piece that I could say “expresses the most” my idea of eroticism.