It’s not that I don’t like modern art…
Ok, that’s a lie. I don’t like modern art. I don’t want a dog poo on a dish to tell me of the human condition and if an unmade bed is worth a lot of money then my entire house deserves to be framed and I should be the richest person on the planet.
I digress – and so early!
I like rich, deep paintings with thick varnish, deep colours; I like symbolism and a story you can get lost in. I like unusual pieces, and portraits that look straight back at me. So here are ten of my favourite art pieces with a homoerotic theme.
Placing this entire post under a cut, and if you click on it, you confirm you are old enough to view art. 😉
1. The Warren Cup – made in the first century, and pretty much unshowable until the 1990’s. This spectacular and unique (as a survivor) piece is an amazing relic and one that shows us much about the Roman world. What’s depressing is that no-one is portrayed as ENJOYING themselves. The piece is now in the British Museum and worth a couple of million pounds. I love the details; the voyeur (probably a slave) – and the harness which has obviously been put in place for the very purpose it’s being used for.
2. Hadrian and Antinous in Egypt by Édouard-Henri Avril
One could argue that his art was perhaps pornographic rather than “art” – it certainly wouldn’t have hung on walls when it was painted! But I like it, not just for the explicit depictions, but the fact that the bodies aren’t perfect specimens and the rather flat look of the art in general. He did many pieces of homoerotic art, illustrations for many racy books of the day which I doubt were available in the ordinary bookshop!
3. Rather different is the School of Plato by Jean Deville – the setting is idealised, romanticised and highly unrealistic. Plato, seeming rather like Jesus in the centre and the only one covered – talks to 12 impossibly beautiful men (the same number as the disciples) in some sylvan meadow. Wikipedia says it’s not a homoerotic scene. I say BAH.
4. Bathing Group 1913 by Henry Scott Tuke.
I try to swallow my modern feeling of discomfort when I look at Tuke’s work. I adore the abandon of the brushstrokes, and the real feeling of a constant Cornish Summer. If you scroll through this gallery you’ll notice the head and shoulders portraits of some spectacularly pretty young men, I just wonder what stories he told them…
5. The Death of Hyacinth by Merry-Joseph Blondel (1781 – 1853 ) I prefer this one marginally over the other version more often seen by Jean Broc because it’s not quite so effeminate – and the background is more detailed – you get more of a sense of Zephyrus here, I think.
6. Zeus and Ganymede. I love this picture and I have no idea who painted it. I prefer it over all the other depictions of Ganymede being abducted by an eagle. It shows a real sense of protection, affection and safety.
7. Phosphorus and Hesperus – Evelyn Pickering De Morgan (1850 – 1919) – I don’t get the symbolism (too bleeding lazy to look it up) but I just love this piece, it reminds me of the art of the art deco with elegant ladies holding torches.
8. Paul Cadmus – The Fleet’s In!
How could anyone not love this? The raunchiness, the rounded bottoms, the life, the colours – the wistful look on the old woman’s face. Apparently it was removed from exhibition because of the man with the red tie who the sailor is attempting to pick up. A red tie was a signal for “i am gay” back then. (Although I don’t think he needed the tie, to be honest.)
9. Howard Pyle’s Arthurian and Robin Hood Illustrations. This is Sir Kay, but my favourites are the Robin Hood illustrations, which I can’t find to show you. But I adore the pre-raphaelites, with all those wonderful Byrne-Jones’ parfait and gentil knights.
10. Bridegroom and Sad Love by Simeon Solomon (1865) – It’s not the art that I love in this, it’s the concept, and shows that men have been chosing beards forever.
Please share any others you like!
The Macaronis 
September 4, 2008 at 11:11 am
These are lovely! (And I’m with you on modern art, though I’ve seen some good sculpture.) I do very much like The Fleet is in, and not just for sailor’s bottoms 🙂 LOL at that woman shoving one of them off the wall!
I second you ‘bah’ at the school of Plato. No one stands in the kind of posture of that young man by the tree when they’re seriously thinking about philosophy!
September 4, 2008 at 11:12 am
Oh, also sorry for posting the Austen thing today. I didn’t realize it would clash. Maybe I can unpost it and post it tomorrow instead.
September 4, 2008 at 12:42 pm
Phosphorus was the morning star; Hesperus, the evening star. So you have one holding a torch (because he’s lighting the day before the sun comes up) and the other with a telescope (because Hesperus was supposed to guide sailors). In classical mythology, they were brothers, children of Eos, goddess of the dawn. Evidently, Evelyn de Morgan felt that they were lovers.
And I love the woman in the red skirt who’s trying to pull the sailor to his feet when it’s obvious he’s right where he wants to be–with his arm over his buddy’s crotch.
September 4, 2008 at 12:45 pm
Do you guys know how damn much I love this blog?
LOL
The cup is incredible. All of the examples posted remind me why I loved going to the Brooklyn Museum when I was younger and lived in NY.
Back then it was a viewer friendly place with incredible collections and a freedom to get up close and personal with the art on view.
45 years ago when I was barely able to hold a piece of charcoal my mom enrolled me in their community art classes.
Imagine reclining on the floor and looking up at huge scluptures and touching.
Man, I used to touch things any time I got the chance! I know it was wrong, but I often felt like I could feel the hand of the person who created such beauty.
Thanks for posting!
September 4, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Blessings on your head, Erastes for posting Simeon Solomon’s work.
Research is never ending!
September 4, 2008 at 4:08 pm
Those are beautiful. I’ve only seen a couple of them before, like the one with the sailors. Love the bit about Wikipedia claiming it’s not homoerotic. I think they need to get their eyeglasses prescription updated, if that’s what they see.
I consider a lot of late 19th and early to mid 20th century photography to be gay historical art, too. A lot of photos with men together, there’s enough resemblance that you can see they’re brothers, or, in other cases, just friends, most likely. But some photos leave no doubt in your mind whatsoever. 😀 And there’s a certain charm and innocence and naturalness to so many of them, it almost breaks your heart just to look at them. The poses are so sweet and unselfconscious in many of the photos.
It’s great how active this blog is. I hope a lot of people are able to find it. Do you get a lot of hits?
September 4, 2008 at 5:39 pm
Thanks Alex! And yes, the Cadmus piece is such fun – he did a lot of very amusing paintings – what I like is that there’s so much going on, I think I see something new everytime I look at it.
Hi TJP! Thanks for the explanation – that’s the trouble with me and some art, I love it so much that I simply don’t worry about the message, but when I do know it, it does help a lot!
Hello Jeanne – thanks for commenting! You obviously can draw – God, I wish I could.
Hi Tamara – nice to see you here! I agree, I do like a lot of modern gay photography, I did find someone who was doing men in period costume but I can’t find it now. If I had the resources, those are the photos I’d really like to do. (I’d clean up in the gay historical cover market, at least!!)
I’m happy that you appreciate that we are getting the blog active and galvanised, we have about 20 members now, so you should see some good stuff coming out from here on. Not that many hits as yet – about 100 a day right now, but the only way is up!! Pass the word!
September 5, 2008 at 12:43 am
Absolutely gorgeous artworks here. Some I had not seen before, and some I had seen and never got the homoeroticism. Sometimes I need to be smacked with a cluexfour!
Thanks for posting these, Erastes!
September 5, 2008 at 1:53 am
Hi Erastes,
What a wonderful post! I also adore the work of Thomas Eakins; his “The Swimming Hole” has some of that ‘endless summer’ quality.
(See it here: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art-and-architecture/great-works/eakins-thomas-the-swimming-hole-1885-776575.html)
And is the photographer you’re referring to, James Spada? He has a wonderful series called “Edwardian Men” made recently but in a sepia-toned style that evokes a century past. (Here’s a gallery: http://manstouch.com/spada/spadaphotos.html)
Cheers, and thanks for a lovely, graceful moment in my day!
Lee
September 5, 2008 at 8:48 am
Thanks Meg and Lee – and yes Eakins nearly made the cut, too!
I do like Spada’s work a lot too, and Wilhelm von Gloeden.
September 5, 2008 at 5:35 pm
Lovely! This blog is an education – and that’s a compliment.
September 5, 2008 at 7:53 pm
Thanks Janine!
December 2, 2010 at 6:48 pm
you just have to get used to modern art to appreciate the beauty of it “;’
May 9, 2011 at 9:28 am
Great pix and great blog!
January 16, 2012 at 3:31 pm
I love the Warren cup. It’s so beautiful in it’s detail, and with the voyeur, it even has a little intriguing story. The Greeks and Romans were definitely in a league of their own when it came to art. Artists in Europe emulated them for centuries.
August 27, 2012 at 7:14 am
hmmm…it’s not fair to discriminate modern art all together. With historical context, it was necessary for the different movements to occur such as dadaism, abstract expressionism, etc. What I’m receiving from your opinion is the difficulty to understand works that look like they have nothing to do with the meaning behind it most especially conceptual art. Then again, to each his/her own. I would not want to question your taste either. It’s just an insight.
Lovely choices of homoerotic art works. I like your description of the Zeus and Ganymede. The relaxed position of Ganymede under the protective arm of Zeus is calming and comforting.