Abbey-Roads2

It’s taking on a life of it’s own!

My post on Warhol, with the picture from “The Factory” drew a few comments - via email. Some people were concerned about the nudity. One of the characters has a breast exposed. As an artist - an old one now - I don’t eroticize or objectify the human body. I’ll admit for a time I avoided life studies in my youth because I had - I was late teens, early twenties. I had to get over it - impure thoughts emanate from the heart. To be sure, pornography, along with our adolescent, obsessive-compulsive sexualized culture influences that, while at the same time ensnares the passions. Pornography, soft or hard core, has destroyed our sensibilities. My recent posts and the emails I received have raised the question however, why is the female breast eroticized? Are men’s pecs eroticized? I just don’t get it.

Throughout the history of art the human body has been celebrated for it’s beauty. We have lovely images of the Madonna nursing the Infant Jesus. This one attributed to Da Vinci is particularly tender, chaste, and lovely…yet they all are. I do not even object to a mother nursing in public - it is so not a sexual act. To think so is diabolical, anti-woman, anti-child, -anti-life. Being a prude is not a virtue.

A man who works in our warehouse once shielded his eyes from a metal bas-relief of a similar image of the Madonna. I don’t get it. I have had customers complain of an antique retablo of the Virgin of the Milk we have for sale - a classic Ecuadorian image of devotion. Another person complained of an image we sold of a detail of the Sistine Chapel of one of the allegorical figures nursing a child.

It has got to be the exaggerated American fixation on the breasts of women, the larger the better. There are even restaurants named after them. Radio talk shows, shock jocks, continually talk about them. It is totally absurd. It’s offensive to women. While some women go in for breast enhancement surgery, falling for the vain joy men are attracted to. Regardless of the morality involved, it is just dumb, teenage, adolescent - stupid. Ah! Dorky! (Now the word fits!)

It is such a strange culture we live in. I don’t think I’ll know where to look anymore when speaking to women, especially those who wear printed t-shirts or medals hanging over their breasts, or low cut dresses. C’mon guys - grow up - she ain’t yo’ mama!

Granted, the woman in the Factory photo is not nursing,
however the image remains innocuous - it is emblematic of the decadence, albeit adolescent, of the Warhol milieu. As it stands, it is art - not pornography, no more than Caravaggio’s painting of the Madonna of the Rosary with an old man sucking the breast of a maid - shown here. (Oh! Maybe this breast thing isn’t just a 20th century American male thing?)

It’s just a breast. Learn to think of it as a feeding tube if it’s so troubling. This extraordinary self consciousness of women about their breasts, influenced, in part by men’s lust, keeps many back from even inspecting them for breast cancer or going for mammograms, things that could save their lives. Guys, get over the obsession.

He invented the word ‘nerd’. I never knew that. I didn’t like Dr. Seuss as a kid because I early on developed a taste for fine art, therefore cartoons held no fascination for me. I always read the stories of saints and rarely anything else - well maybe Greek mythology and Grimm’s Fairy Tales - but that is about it.

Now as an adult I like Dr. Seuss and the Simpson’s.

So he invented ‘nerd’. What is the origin of the word ‘dork’? I’ll look that up. What if it says, ‘Terry Nelson’?

Or, Our Lady of Mercy.

Today’s feast of Our Lady is primarily celebrated in South American countries and in Spain. It is the titular feast of the order of friars known as the Mercedarians, founded by St. Peter Nolasco. St. Raymond Nonnatus was also a member of this order, founded to ransom Catholic slaves held captive by Muslims.

Unlike today, when there is no bargaining with terrorists, in those days ransom would be paid to free those held captive. St. Raymond exchanged himself for such and was enslaved for a time. The Saracens pierced his lips with a padlock to prevent him from speaking about the Catholic faith. He himself was later ransomed by his fellow Mercedarians.

Things do not seem to have changed much with Muslim-Christian relations have they? The Holy Father meets with Muslim leaders tomorrow. Let’s pray Our Lady to guide this meeting.

During the English persecutions under the reign of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, devotion to Our Lady of Ransom took on greater fervor in the hopes of bringing the Church of England back into “Our Lady’s Dowry”.

In our day, aside from the continued threats of terrorism, our culture is faced with many other moral afflictions, such as addictions to vice and various obsessive-compulsive disorders. Our Lady of Ransom would seem to be the title one could implore Our Lady to obtain freedom from those sins that ensnare us.

There are modest fashions available. Check the web. A woman can find modest fashions that do not look like Pollyanna or some gypsy fortune teller. I found them.

1st photo: Ralph Lauren, Spring 2006

But if someone is serious about modest fashions, go into design. Study fashion design - go to school. Educate your taste. Go back to the earlier designers; Chanel, Balenciaga, Dior, Givenchy, Blass, and research what was classic in their designs and update it. Fashion is nothing but older looks updated and recycled. Be creative. What I have seen on modesty fashion sites is awful.

I have some photos here of modest fashions. Is the skirt too short? Lengthen it. The neckline too low? Wear a shell or a scarf. There is nothing wrong with these clothes. The mistake many women and girls make is they go after trend instead of classics - or sometimes worse, they go after “cute” - only babies and little kids are cute. There is no reason to look dowdy. If you don’t have taste, get advice. If you can’t afford designer, learn to sew. But don’t dress like a frump.

2nd photo: Ralph Laren, Fall 2006

Could she be any more covered?

3rd photo: Ralph Lauren, Fall 2006

What could be more modest except maybe a burka?

4th photo: Balenciaga, Spring 2006.

This dress is modest, simple,
clean, no silly frillies.
(Lengthen the skirt if it’s too short.)

There are indeed modest styles out there - search the web. Granted, the above examples may be for women instead of girls, but they are examples. Ray, of Stella Borealis found this site from Regnum Christi - not exactly high fashion, but it’s contemporary, and as I told him, it doesn’t look like “Little House On The Prairie”.