C-LAB Learning Culture｜Urban, Culture and Everyday life
“Stains”: We Thought Culture was a Sanitizer, But You Really Should Be Getting Dirty

Date/Time: Nov. 8th (Fri.) 19:00
Venue: West i-CENTER, 2F
Speaker: Lu Yu-Chia (Writer)

In the Japanese drama series, The Naked Director, Ikezawa, head of the largest pornography company, produces pornographic materials that are ethereal and beautiful, which even includes a cosplay version with real people portraying the naked women in the Neoclassicism painting, The Turkish Bath, by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres. Dressed in a pristinely white suit, Ikezawa lies to his daughter that he works in the field of advertising.

Newcomer Toru Muranishi looks for the kitschiest elements in life. He puts nerdy glasses on a porn star and directs her to step on the naked back of a young man with bleached blonde hair. The porn star comes alive like that woman sitting at the next table inside a local diner. The whole thing is so kitsch, so dirty.

Together, the two reenact the art history of Europe, with Muranishi launching the first shot inspired by the 19th century impressionism painting, Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe (The Luncheon on the Grass) by Édouard Manet. Naked woman is originally considered a theological symbol, as seen in Greek myths and the Bible. The naked women painted by Ingres were set in a far distant palace in Turkey. They must be fake! They won’t get you dirty. The naked woman in Manet’s painting is accompanied by two gentlemen in black suits. The scandal between them is so obvious. So dirty! So offensive! Ikezawa’s rendition of the painting by Ingres is like that imitation Louvre at the Chimei Museum or the forged Roman colosseum at the Asia University. People yearn to be cleansed and wish to elevate themselves and become upper-class. But, as we chase after being purified, what have we missed along the way?