Mirror Smasher
Yoko Ono, Fashion for Men (1969/2012)
ÒI wonder why men get serious at all. They have this delicate, long thing hanging outside their bodies which goes up and down by its own will. If I were a man I would always be laughing at myself.Ó
ÐÐ Yoko Ono
Why is it art if Nam June Paik puts TV monitors on the breasts of beautiful and talented Charlotte Moorman and it's "silly" when Yoko Ono puts bells on beautiful, and probably talented, male models' nipples?
Men of this generation are not used to seeing themselves objectified, while women are inundated with sexualized images of their gender. Are only furred and feathered males adorned for mating rituals? Look at the embroidered, wigged and high-heeled men of Louis' court, knights in damascened armor, even their swords and firearms covered in swirls of the Arabesque. Were they only to impress and intimidate the competition?
As Lyta Alexander of
Santa Sangre puts it, "Finally, a fashion line
objectifying the male body as a focus for sexual desireÉI remember numerous fashion lines with hearts, hand-prints and other similar symbols in the female breasts or buttocks, and nobody
bothered to get enraged."
Check out the comments at
http://designtaxi.com/news/354496/Yoko-Ono-Launches-An-Intriguing-Fashion-Line-For-Men/. It's almost 2013 and people are still outraged? Similar statements may have
been made by feminist artists over the years, but Yoko, again using her celebrity as a medium, puts the question in the right place, to the right people.
ÐÐ Rika Ohara
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