A few years ago we saw a documentary about Henry Darger-In the Realm of the Unreal.
Darger, undiscovered in his lifetime, spent his days painting and writing about little girls, often in epic battles with soldiers or other forces. Although the pictures above don't show it, in many of his murals the little girls were naked and anatomically incorrect. Some speculate he had only his only anatomy to go by--he was a first-rate eccentric and recluse. Watching the doc. I came away with a fairly benign opinion of Darger.
But seeing his work closeup, I felt like he was expressing some sort of wish through his art, maybe unacted upon, but there. I was especially troubled by Dargerism where a number of artists, mostly female, were using his tropes for similar work.
I don't mind being troubled by art or not understanding it, but this veered too close to pedophilic porn for me. Google Darger and see some more of it. What do you think?
1 comment:
Well, the embrace of Darger was always in part a recognition of his damage, I think. Also an exploitation of it?
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