Favourite
Things
Edouard
Detaille's Vive l'empereur (1891)
commissioned
by THE GOOD WEEKEND (unpublished due to use of the word
'precum'), Melbourne, 2006
When Brad Pitt rages forth into mock heroic battle in yet
another Hollywood Hormonal Digital Fantasy, I wonder
if he leaks precum as his hugging bodice is wracked
by thrusting blades. While Hollywood is an easy
target for those glistening male-o-dramas, European
high culture offers equally hysterical glorifications
of war. Standing in front of Edouard Detaille's massive Vive
l'empereur (1891) invites similar loin-quivering. Exploiting the 'impossible-snapshot' of the frozen hyper-drama in Romantic oil rendering, the painting places one side-on as a cavalry exits stage-left. The horses' vein-ridden necks shoot adrenaline energy, connecting to the terse jaw lines of their riders. A deafening silence roars from their gaping mouths as they are posited like gaping sex-mannequins waiting for their facial bath. Their rouge marks them as mortician's cadavers. Like all heroes in war, they're going to die with a hard-on. And they did. Their sons now star in Lord of the Anal Rings.
