Wells 167-204, La Cicciolina

I thought the case study assigned in our Wells reading was particularly fascinating. To refresh your memory, it was of La Cicciolina, the Italian Hungarian porn star, Illona Staller. The photos taken of her were over the top- described as ‘camp like’ (having a queer aesthetic) or ‘kitschy’ (ironic appreciation). The pictures of her have recently become popularized because of irony; “softcore porn, seen as one of the lowest and most irredeemable forms of popular culture… has become of capable of being rehabilitated through irony” (191).

I thought this was an interesting comment to make about popular culture of today. Speaking more generally than just photography, this obsession with ‘kitsch’ knowledge reminded me of a finding I made in the Masculinities class I took last year. For my research paper in that class, I looked into alternative masculinities (specifically in the arena of indie rock music), in order to understand how the ‘rules’ of acceptance change in terms of bodies and culture. One of the main findings in ethnographic studies I came across was that you are more accepted into this alternative masculine culture with the more you identify with ‘kitsch’ appreciation. It took me awhile to understand what ‘kitsch’ really meant, but I think Wells describes it nicely in this passage. These low-culture photos become more respectable when you apply this layer of ‘seeing past’ the ridiculousness, to the point where it makes fun of how “respectable softcore magazines such as Playboy” (191) display the same kinds of bodies in more normal contexts. This series re-contextualizes the ridiculous idea of these “smooth, unblemished, classical bodies” (191) so that you understand that it is not real. I like this concept, because it is a pretty obvious, in-your-face, vulgar example of how photographs are manipulated, and do not represent truth.