Rodin was the one to free sculpture from formalism and bring it to life, his expressive style, evoking both the concrete sensuality of flesh and the mystical purity of spirit, plays with shadows and light, with details and textures, and makes marble and bronze truly human.

When I was really, really young, there was a whole Kamasutra trend among my friends, male and female alike. The mythical Art of Lovemaking was arousing everyone’s imagination. It sounded deep, mysterious and dirty, and it was all about an universe we were yet to discover. Our minds were tremendously fancying twisted positions and strange techniques, and nothing seemed as exciting as this naive surface-scratching.

Of course, it took me some years to get it right. Some life experiences and some reading, and most of all, some “giving up preconceptions” work, which, I have to admit it wasn’t easy.

Kamasutra was written around 150 B.C. by the Indian scholar Vatsyayana and it is composed of seven parts, 36 chapters, and a total amount of 1250 verses. It describes the practices and discipline of sensual pleasures and it is NOT a tantric text. It does not describe tantric rites, nor do its content have tantrical connotations as it is a book for the noble and the righteous, and it does not address the specific group of the Left Hand followers. On the contrary, it’s rather practical than mystical and it refers to the carnal, legitimate pleasures of day-to-day life.

One of Kamasutra’s more important concerns, however, it is the spirituality of its reader and its relationship to carnality. The book approaches matters of soul with wisdom and it raises important warnings for the young and inexperienced profane, unaware of sexuality’s hidden dangers. Seeking these pleasures for your senses is enriching you, but it can also enslave you to this world and its materiality, to your own desires and the karma they create. That is why Kamasutra is also emphasizing one’s relationship with the other: choosing, getting to know, getting close and getting intimate. Before talking of positions and penetration it talks of kissing and embracing, of beginning and ending, of arts and virtue. Of loving and committing yourself to giving pleasure to the loved one. Of understanding and practicing sensuality as a whole.

“Kama is the enjoyment of appropriate objects by the five senses of hearing, feeling, seeing, tasting and smelling, assisted by the mind together with the soul. The ingredient in this is a peculiar contact between the organ of sense and its object, and the consciousness of pleasure which arises from that contact is called Kama.” (Vatsyayana, Kamasutra).

If interested, you can find here the original translation from Sanskrit, as first printed in 1883.

]]> http://www.sansinnocence.com/memories-of-kamasutra/feed/ 0 http://www.sansinnocence.com/venus-retrograde/ http://www.sansinnocence.com/venus-retrograde/#comments Tue, 10 Mar 2009 15:37:55 +0000 Sans Innocence http://www.sansinnocence.com/?p=536 Astrology says Venus is retrograde in this period, starting from 6th of March to the 17th of April, which invites us to rethink and analyze our lives and relationships, to restructure and re-engineer our worlds, to rest, relax and gather our forces for the magnificent times ahead.

The backwards nude Venus picture I’m offering here is a famous Velasquez, and it represents the goddess of beauty and love while looking in the mirror, in a moment of solitude. ‘Cause mirroring, beloved readers, is essential.

When the new born art of photography made its first steps into the wild world of the 19th century, it soon became clear it was going to change the world forever. The way reality it reflected reality was something no one had never seen: real, strong, precise. That precise that it claimed different aesthetics and a different view upon the morality of arts. A painted nude is a painting, one can recognize it as artwork and place it somewhere faraway from the immediate, from excitement. Because it is a painting and only a painting, and no matter how accurate it would be, it will never look really real. But a piece of nude photography is something different. The person in the picture is right there, just the way she is in real life. Unbelievably similar. You can almost thing of touching her. You can desire her, fall for her, because you can tell she is real. And that, my friends, is a scandal. Or at least it was considered this way in the late 19th – early 20th centuries period. In France a whole bunch of nude photographies were called postcards – although it was pretty obvious they weren’t meant to be sent by mail – and, although, actually because, many men truly appreciated them, they got banned in some more religious, conservative countries of the time, such as the Ottoman Empire.

Later on, however, the works of artists such as E. J. Bellocq, Julian Mandel, A.H. Nicholls or Edward Weston brought into people’s attention the iridescent beauty of human forms, male and female alike, when “indecently” exposed. When there is truth, purity of thought and strength of expression one cannot make up any accusation of pornography. Art is having something to say and showing it indirectly, instead of saying. It is when any primal, basic, unrefined material gets past his usual borders and becomes light.

There is no such a thing as peace in Edvard Munch’s art. The Norwegian painter, well known as a precursor of the Expressionism, succeeded in establishing new aesthetic boundaries in a time when the 19th century was slowly dying, and the 20th was not even born. His passionate lines, his anxiety, his tortured, struggling characters mixed in order to create a deeply symbolical imagery, abstractive of fears, love, obsessions and mysticism alike. The woman, as Munch sees it, is either pure, angelical, high above all materialism, or the very embodiment of sin and decay. As the Madonna painting so strongly reveals us, sensuality and religious matters are forever entangled in artist’s vision, who won’t dissociate between mystical and sexual ecstasy: the beloved one is on love’s highest heights, and that gives her the very transfiguration of sacred suffering. The ultimate intensity is the path to ultimate truth. When lovers are lost in their union, love itself increases their delirious concupiscence, love itself becomes a devouring force, melting their individualities into one, center-absorbed spiral. And when love is gone, there’s nothing else left but despair and despair alone.

Ladies and gentlemen, may I humbly bow and talk to you about one of the world’s most melancholic and passionate musical genres. It is called Fado (a Portuguese word normally translated as Fate) and it miraculously emerged, under its nowadays shape, from Mouraria, one of the oldest Moorish neighbourhoods of Lisboa. Its mysterious birth dates from the very begining of the 19th century, although earlier, deeper roots are generally admitted. It seems to have been the astonishing, heartbreaking result of a powerful multicultural combination: the black rhythms of African slaves, the traditional music of old Portugal, the Moorish vocal inflexions and the Brazilian modihna.

Fado talks of loss and longing, talks of people’s lives and talks of people’s soul. It has in it the sea and its tenderness. It is mostly made of desires and their stories, desires that are not meant for fulfillment, but for singing and sublime renouncement. It is the ultimate strength of the human soul: to escape and overcome reality. It is poetry and poetry only. And so is the love it describes. Defined mostly by the untranslatable word “saudade” – which counts for infinite longing for someone or something, a form of nostalgia that is bigger than life and more profound than the Atlantic ocean – love in fado’s short stories is built out of poetry and tragic passion, it forever breaks the tide of ordinary to melt itself into its own flame.

This beautiful world of sounds and feeling is my gift for today. Hope you’ll enjoy it. The gorgeous lady in the above movie is Amalia Rodrigues, Portugal’s greatest modern days fadistas and one of Europe’s “grand dames”.

It was a cold, rainy morning and I was having a coffee at some cheap cafe when I met him. It seemed that the universe indulged itself into a moment of no importance, as my capacity of foretelling – so goddamn vain. There are some minor excuses I can think of, though. I was never fond of perfect things, they raised me no interest as I had an ultimate passion for the exotic, the unusual, the specific. He was obviously anything but my type: pure, classical face lines, classical black coat, classical everything. Depressingly classical. I successfully ignored his appearance, while pretending to be over-absorbed with my newspaper. Storms. Fire. Genocides. War. Middle East. Mexico Gulf. Arctic Ice. He ordered tea. Minutes later, got something with a slight cinnamon flavour, while waiting patiently at a small, round table, pretty close to mine. Suddenly, the cafe’s huge window opened wide in my back side, spreading its light as some white, weird mist. Windy weather. I couldn’t help feeling annoyed. I took a look around. The cafe was almost empty. Two people, two not-so-bare tables. No music.

When it comes to depicting sexuality and torment, Egon Schiele remains one of my favourite artists ever. His strong, expressive brushstrokes, the power of his drawing and the intensity of his bold, amazing colours produced quite an impression on me when, at some early stage in my life I had made the thrilling discovery of him. All those striking images, considered by many grotesque, even pornographic, constituted themselves, for the teenager I was back then, into a beautiful, tremendous revelation. This was the storm true passions and their clash was supposed to provoke, the fire haunted, restless, thirsty spirits I imagined would ignite all around them, this was the burning road to one’s self – somehow related, at a rather subliminal level, to the tantric yoga’s “Left-Hand Path”: getting to know the ultimate truth trough decadent, extreme practices supposed to integrate spirituality and sex in their reach for pure consciousness. A first impression which has never left me. And who proved itself persistent and influential to my imaginarium, all the way ’till now, I confess.

For more info on the Austrian expressionist artist you can read one of his biographies here and there are also a large number of online galleries hosting his works, such as this quite complete one or this. I wish you a pleasant and enriching experience in this so very controverted – at its time – world.

Well, ok, I guess I can also share something here. The more, the merrier. So, my favourite things: white silk, black velvet, high heels, sandalwood, long kisses in dark corners, heavy winters and heavy snow, cream, hot tea, bold men, strong wills, wine, indigo paper, perfume bottles, good manners, grace, drama, trains, courtship, countrysides, fireplaces. Intuition. And smarts.

Time for evaluating them all, now: what are your favourite things?