Wolfgang Eichler
Fetishist photos that strangely combine the most diverse
and seemingly antagonistic subjects. The question is why these far from
shocking pictures should get on the wrong side of the law, or at least
attract the indignation of “right-thinking normal people”
- the same people who lie in front of cable TV porn? That’s the
mystery. It touches on what is most intimate. The purpose of pornography
is incontestably to arouse the libido, but through a commonplace act (the
most commonplace act in the world) and a vaguely ideal person (a naked
girl). In these photos, a different kind of excitement is targeted. It
comes more from the posture than the person holding it, more from the
subject than the act. That’s the definition of fetishism: the part
is more important than the whole. Latex matters more than skin. The instrument
of torture attracts and holds the attention. For example, the omnipresent
mask in Wolfgang Eichler’s photos. There is something infinitely
more disturbing and probably more pornographic than a big sex organ. SM
photos unsettle the viewer, who wonders what turns him on the most. Is
it the girl in another magazine that he’d like to shag or is it
the posture, the gesture, the colour or the latex? The protection of latex?
Jean Luc Godard said of his own aesthetic, "It’s not blood
it’s red.” The reversal operated by the photos means that
it’s not women, it’s figures – and what figures! Sexual
meaning is strikingly subverted. Usually when we see women we want to
screw them. In this case, just what do we want to do? Just what do these
photos arouse in us? What strange places are they inviting us to visit?
A simple coitus evangelus or – what’s the word? Domination?
Submission? Prohibition? Rubber screen?
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