Not surprising, I guess, given that those for Henson are trying to disassociate him from child porn. But no-one is going out of their way to make any distinction between illegal CP and the legal porn that the majority of Australians own or watch at some point in their lives.

“What pornographer has his work in the collections of public museums around the world?” asks art critic John McDonald. Good question. Why is porn considered to be non-art? Why must “high art” make so much effort to declare itself to be above the “baser” urgers? Does being turned on preclude all other thoughts and senses? And why is the human response of sexual arousal to be spurned when any other emotion or response is acceptable?

Yes, Tony and I may have differed on all sorts of points in this debate, but I’ll definitely hand him this one.

And yes… dammit. I’ve spent even more time thinking about and discussing this topic when I said I was finished with it. Now, I’ll try and leave it be.

Anyway, thanks to a brave and commendable decision by the ABC to change their schedule on Tuesday night and show the profile of Bill Henson, I’ve now seen examples of his work, including his landscapes. My personal response was to find his photos quite beautiful, to be honest. There’s a real painterly aesthetic to them. The show also showed several of the nude teen pics, including several of a boy. Most of them looked very serious and meaningful, posed with infinite care. A couple did have a sexual aspect that was both intriguing and slightly disturbing.

I found myself thinking that if Henson IS a dirty old man as is being alleged, he’s got a very complicated way of expressing his urges. But if I were to judge purely on the appearances of that show, it looked like he was far more concerned with framing and light than getting a hard on for his models. And then again… I feel like this shouldn’t even be an issue.

And the other thing I thought is that it’s Henson’s status as a middle aged male that has probably drawn the fire. If these pictures were self portraints by teens, would there be this much fuss? Another Australian photographer recently held an exhibition featuring photos of her own naked children (I can’t remember her name). She was making a statement about the nascent sexuality of children with her work but you could argue that her pics are child porn. Certainly there’s less consent involved because her kids are only little.

It looks like the argument is coming back to definitions of child porn according to the law and social mores. Plenty of people have been saying that there should be NO images of naked children or teenagers shown in public at all. And I guess the next step is that we shouldn’t take pictures of kids in the bath. A society that declares that there’s no such thing as non-sexual nudity and no such thing as a non-sexual photo of child nudity, is a very confused society indeed.

In theory child porn is illegal because it documents child abuse which is a crime. But if no crime has occurred, why is the photo still illegal? The “criminal intent to arouse” theory is well and truly in operation here. And I really don’t like the idea that we go around censoring things just in case someone wrongly gets aroused. Saying “the photo made me do it” is a cop out and makes society complicit in the pedophile’s decision to act on his thoughts.

Yuck. Here I am defending pedophiles… I hate having to do this. But I guess it has to be said. There should never be a law against thinking about something – even if that something is a criminal act. It’s when you DO it that the law should be involved.

In the case of Henson, no illegal act has actually occurred. The models and their parents support Henson and aren’t making any complaints. So, as I originally said, people are debating the motives of Henson (including myself). He’s in trouble for thought crime.

The idea that a photo is illegal because of what it might make you think sets up a dichotomy of those who are authorised to view it and those who aren’t. Apparently the police who have confiscated those photos are lofty individuals who are able to handle looking at them, as are the moral guardians who will be deciding on the case in court. The public, on the other hand, need to be protected. This is the essence of censorship.

Trixie, your feminist perspective about whether Henson should be the person speaking on behalf of the sexuality of teenage girls is a valid one. I guess the problem now is that the topic is officially off limits thanks to this incident, so no-one, not even teen girls, will be allowed to go there. The Americans call it a “cooling effect on free speech” I think.

I don’t like to assume all men are “dirty old men” either, BUT. And I’m not assuming this guy is, just saying that is/was my gut reaction and I’d personally bet money on it. Another way to look at this is as similar to cultural misappropriation. He says he’s using young women’s bodies to artistically convey something about the human condition. I’m not denying that he is, and perhaps successfully (which is part of what makes it art, even if he fails, or at least a pretty good way to con himself and others into thinking he’s doing more than making high brow porn). But part of what chaps my hide and makes me judge him is that *men* so OFTEN do use women’s bodies to make their statements instead of speaking from a perspective that they own. It’s like he’s speaking FOR young women. Maybe I’m muddying the waters here by bringing in more issues than just whether or not he should be censored and whether or not legal action is warranted, but for me this kind of behavior and posturing automatically makes his intentions suspect. I’m not saying that middle-aged men shouldn’t be able to make art speaking with their rendition of teen women’s voices, I’m just saying that I personally feel a bit contemptuous of it and suspicious about it, in a similar way to how I feel about white people trying to write characters of color or rich people trying to write poor characters. When you add the element of sexual exploitation of a minor into the mix, it raises my hackles even more.

Do I think he should go to prison? Probably not. Do I think the outrage over it is bizarre considering the other things people turn a blind eye to? Yes. But I also think people have good reason to be highly critical of his work, along with the parents who facilitate its creation and his defense of it.

Again, coming from my own dirty old man perspective I don’t have a problem with people seeing it, wanting to see it, or being aroused by it; while I acknowledge it has an artistic component, I’m less interested in defending that and more interested in recognizing that even if it IS erotic, it shouldn’t be criminal or viewed as pathological to view it and enjoy it, even from that “base” perspective. BUT looking at it from the perspective of women, especially young women, and the desire to protect them from being sexually exploited and manipulated I think “art” is a flimsy shield to defend that. I don’t care if it’s art, or next top model, or porn if the end result is the same: a young person put into a potentially painful experience, exploited and publicly exposed and sexualized in a way that she has no control over. I’m not saying that young women are NOT sexual, or that people who recognize that sexuality are monsters, I’m just saying I don’t like seeing kids suckered into situations where they are manipulated into sharing that and having it twisted and packaged to meet the needs of an adult where there is a major power imbalance. While it may be unfair to judge this guy as a dirty old man right off the bat, it’s also unfair and dangerous to disregard the realities of age, gender, and power all acting to make shooting with someone like this guy a really yucky experience for these girls. I don’t think it’s irrational or hyperconservative to be extremely concerned about his models or the slippery slope of allowing “artists” to have access to and depict real-life (not computer generated or body-doubled) nude adolescents. Twelve is really young. It really, really is, and no amount of intellectualizing the end product can change where most twelve year olds are at, developmentally.

“Art” may be defined by history as you say but it’s also be defined within the eye of the beholder – as you have done in your comment above.

I think individuals should have the right to personally decide what they think is art and what isn’t (and what is good or bad art). As opposed to the government making the decision, which is what has happened here, and it’s what I’m protesting against.

I did the obligatory surreal musing about definitions of art when I studied it in high school. Now I’ve got a more practical view of it, which informs my original post. I tend to think of “art” as a creative expression that discusses or depicts ideas, thoughts, nature or the human condition. Yes, it’s a broad and quick definition but it does the job. It’s a definition that easily includes porn although my personal ethics would preclude child porn as art (and I’m not going to go into that here).

Who is an artist, then? A chardonnay sipper with tenure at uni? The landscape painter? The embroiderer? The chef? The sex blogger? The pornographer?

Can the graffiti spray painter be an artist when their actions are against the law?

Your original objection is against the way that authorities and free speech defenders like to draw a line down the middle and divide expression into “art” = good and “porn” = bad. I too reject that idea.

But in trying to remove that line it feels like you’re saying that nothing qualifies as art because the term is too nebulous and easily misused.

If nobody can be an artist, what do we call ourselves when we creatively give expression to thoughts and feelings?

Surely you feel that your films are a form of art? And by using film stock and good lighting and putting sex into context, I’m sure you feel your art is better than, say, Dirtpipe Milkshakes. Although the raincoater who loves said Dirtpipe film may disagree. Again, personal opinion defines art.

So then we get the “high art” of the opera I went to last night versus tonight’s Eurovision song contest or an Idol show. That same “art vs porn” dividing line comes into play here. It’s all just a matter of snobbery in the end.

So… does the work of Henson qualify as art or is it child porn? The boundaries apply to everyone like you say, but where are those boundaries? The police say Henson has crossed them, the mob with torches says he’s crossed them, the art community disagrees. I can’t make a personal decision on whether it’s art because the work has been censored and I haven’t been allowed to make that call. Except that I’m siding with the artists on free speech principles. Or I’m possibly being snobbish, I’m not sure.

It’s midnight. Time to go to bed. This post doesn’t really resolve any issues and it’s possible that it contradicts some of my previous thoughts, but I had to write it down to get it out of my head. It’s too late to debate such weighty issues, especially after seeing the Sex Bomb skater win the Eurovision song contest.

Neither of us have seen the work so what we’re doing now is just speculating – on meanings, on intentions, on facts. Is sexuality conspicuously absent from his work or is it all about sex as Hetty Johnson maintains? Who knows? We’re not allowed to see it.

And it feels like we’re still just agreeing with each other in strident terms.

So given my real ignorance of the work and the artist, why am I taking Henson’s side?

I’ve realised I’m on his side because the art galleries, his fellow artists, the art lecturers and the freedom of speech activists are on his side. Which sounds far more appealing than siding with the talkback radio hosts, the conservative columnists and the people who want to burn down art galleries.

You’ve used the term “chablis drinking pals” which I believe is the equivalent phrase to “chardonnay sippers” here, most often used by conservative columnists to dismiss all those nasty “elites” in the universities who think for a living.

I like chardonnay. I’m often inclined to sip it.

If Mr. Henson were genuinely interested in adolescent sexuality, the confusion, the ambiguity, then their sexuality wouldn’t be so conspicuously absent from his work.

But he isn’t an artist of any sort. He’s a cheap provocateur with a keen sense of just how far he can go and count on his chablis-drinking pals to rise to his defense. He’s out the bait; and we’ve all taken it, “But it’s art! It’s Art! IT’S ART!”

Is there anything illegal about a midaged man whiling away his afternoons with naked 12 year-old girls? I don’t know. What I do know is that carrying around a camera while you do it, making art doesn’t make it any more or less illegal.

So again, let’s please stop asking where the boundaries for artist are. It’s a stupid question with a simple answer: The boundaries are in the same place for artists as they are for everyone else.

If you look through my family photo albums, you’ll see the ubiquitous bath time snapshots and pics of a naked (or topless) little girl running around on the beach. After a few years the nakedness becomes wrong or dirty until the magic age of 18 when the Girls Gone Wild bus pulls up and the girls (oops, now women) once again are allowed to run around naked.

As a society we’re saying there is a 10 (12? 15?) year age gap that artists aren’t allowed to even consider? Huh?

I agree with Trixie that a lot of the interest in the burgeoning sexuality of that age is going to be coming from a strictly horn dog kind of place. That’s human nature and part of what would make the art so provocative (assumption of course, since I can’t see it). Anything that invokes the memories of that time in our lives when our hormones were running wild, our bodies were changing, and boys and girls started noticing each other for the first time has the potential to be quite powerful.

Maybe I’m just an idealist but I do want to believe that this man has a dispassionate, artist’s desire to capture a human condition – one that does involve aspects of sexuality.

In doing so I’m not saying that art cannot be about sex or arousal, nor that porn is a bad thing. As Tony has said, the intent of the photographer or artist shouldn’t really be the point, but it is now because charges have been laid.

In any case what’s happened here is the aim of “art” in the first place, which is to create discussion and thought. And to stir up hornest’s nests, it seems.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have blogged about this topic at all, since I may find myself defending the post endlessly. This is a topic with many shades of grey and I refuse to see it in monotones, which is what conservatives do. But a complex issue requires a lot of writing to get through it… and I’m off for the weekend.