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Originally Posted by pocon1
there is no point (unless someone is willing to make a logical point, be my guest) except to take naked pictures of an underage girl. There is a statement "You cannot censor me, I am an artiste".
Mainstream art. What is that? Stuff that does not cross the line into illegal and reprehensible activities? You run around with a camera and claim to be an artist, but here is the beauty of the internet. You can always find a few thousand people to agree with you on the internet, and it makes you believe that you are right. Sharing an opinion with a few other people across the globe does not make you right.
As far as the studio, when someone specifically arranges to have naked child in a place designed to take pictures and then takes them with the specific mindset of producing such pictures, then it becomes a situation.
This is not a family album where someone has some pictures taken in the family and not for public display. This artist put these pictures out in the public domain for commercial sale. Studios sell art. Therefore it is commercial.
One other thing, in an earlier post you state that you would protect this because it is something that has not been seen before. It has been seen before, and that is why many people are vehemently opposed to it. And yes, you can have good photography skills and be a creep with a camera. Hitler wanted to be an artist and architect.
So we trust the judgement of these parents? Not for me. I think they made a bad choice. Just like parents who buy their kids pot or alcohol because they would rather have them drink or do drugs at home. Or take the case of the Mormons marrying off their teen daughters to be raped into the church. That was also parental decisions taking place in Texas.
Kids often think they they are ready to make adult decisions, when they are really not. It is up to the parents, and to a smaller extent society to help them. A kid at thirteen is not ready to decide if they should be photographed nude. And the parents failed to look out for their child. Maybe the parents should be under investigation for child welfare neglect and endangerment.
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So, if I understand you correctly, if a photojournalist takes a photo of a naked child suffering the cruelty of war, it is acceptable, even though the photojournalist was well-paid for the photograph. But if an artist takes a photo of a naked teenager suffering nothing but the usual miseries of adolescence, in a nice safe studio, that constitutes reprehensible commercial exploitation of children.
It sounds to me like you're saying that there is no possible way for anyone under the age of 18 to be nude in a photograph for any reasons but titillation and sexual exploitation. Any artist taking such a photo, it sounds like you're saying, cannot call the picture art, because too many people would find the photo offensive or distasteful-- or, alternatively, sexually stimulating. Which, to me, sounds as though you're saying that in order to be art-- at least, the sort of art that deserves protection and toleration by a free society-- there can be no themes that would offend the mores of the conservative majority of society, or unduly provoke sexual reaction in anyone at all.
This seems not only an unreasonably narrow definition of art, but also historically unrealistic. Much of the greatest art reflects the willingness of artists to push boundaries, to express things that the majority of their society are not expressing, or are not expressing in the same way as the artists in question. Many great paintings and drawings were considered inappropriate-- works by El Greco, Gustave Dore, Paul Gaugin, Paul Rubens, Matthias Grunewald, and Hieronymous Bosch, among others-- many innovations of style or theme considered in poor taste-- surrealism, dadaism, impressionism, expressionism, symbolism, mannerism...even some neoclassicist works. I am by no means saying the photographs in question here are or ever will be masterworks on the scale of the kinds of works I've just mentioned; but my point is that one never knows what will end up being "good" or "real" art.
I said before, and I'm happy saying again, I am not the biggest fan of these photographs, although I do think they are decent work, interesting, and not sexual. But even if I thought them verging on tasteless, I would still wish to err on the side of artistic freedom and tolerance. I just don't believe art should be ruled by the mores of the masses. And I cannot help but note that, as the art in question appears to be decidedly not to your tastes, you feel comfortable comparing the photographer to Hitler. That seems...a bit extreme.
And while the photographer in question seems to have gone to some lengths to ensure that there was no deception or compulsion forcing his young subjects to do anything they do not wish to do, including securing parental approval for all works, you maintain that "a kid at thirteen is not ready to decide if they should be photographed nude." This seems like a fairly gross generalization. Some kids, no doubt are not. Some kids might be or might not be. Some kids would clearly be ready for such a decision. To simply include all the world's adolescents in one wave of the hand seems like an unreasonably rigid definition to me. And you dismiss the parental approval just as universally as "bad parenting." But isn't it more precise to say that it's a parenting choice you don't personally approve of, and that you would not make? You compare it to parents who prefer to let their kids experiment with alcohol or marijuana in controlled situations, rather than on the proverbial streets, which you clearly also consider reprehensible-- and yet many might say otherwise. I myself would consider doing so, and I have known many whose parents did just that for them, and they turned out to be healthy adults, productive members of society with neither addictions nor repressive attitudes about experimentation or pleasure.
Art, like parenting, is done differently by different people, experienced differently, appreciated differently. Different ways can have value. With all due respect, it seems to me that, in general, and within certain parameters, rather than classifying parenting as "good" or "bad," by universalizing the measures of one's own preferences, it is more productive to do for one's own children what one's conscience dictates, and presume that other parents are doing the same with their children. And rather than censoring artistic endeavors we find distasteful, one might simply decide to view and purchase the art that is to one's own tastes, and ignore what is not. In that way, one need not encounter art one finds disagreeable, and yet artists are not subjected to prosecution for pushing the boundaries of art.
I'm sorry if I have spoken firmly-- I don't wish to give offense-- but as an artist, and a supporter of artistic communities, and a friend of many artists, I feel quite strongly that the government has no business deciding what is and is not art, to say nothing of deciding what sort of art can or cannot be shown publicly, or whether unpopular artists deserve imprisonment or not.