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The Artist Muses
MICHAEL KIRWAN
Kirwan self portrait (2002)
I have to say
that I'm mighty sick of this flood of ordinariness. Lately I've
noticed the profusion of
“reality” shows offered on television. I keep the set on all day,
every day. For someone who works alone at home and spends
unbelievable amounts of time sitting and drawing, television is an
invaluable tool. It's company that doesn't require my attention,
and I can flit among the channels for the less abrasive and
obtrusive programming. Right through all the reality
cop shows, talk shows, Court TV,
all-crammed-in-a-box-together shows, dating shows, and so on.
However, snippets of “real,” authentic human activity don't
qualify as entertainment for me. When I want to see real people, I
go to the post office, the grocery store, or just stroll the
streets. The purpose of art is to
condense and distill the doings of men, to create characters
emblematic of the human condition, and to enlighten and illuminate
by filtering human behavior through the artist's singular vision.
That's what I
try to do with my drawings, to encapsulate the various terrains,
conditions, and connections made in the gay world. I think of
myself as a pictorial historian, committing every queer's
experience to paper. I don’t draw from models or real people. My
guys are stand-ins for everyone who's ever sucked a dick,
incorporating the lust, confusion, contentment, guilt, passion,
and bonding that I observe in the homo realm. I’d like viewers to
recognize familiar situations and see a spark of their own lives
displayed in my work, to sense the true brotherhood inherent in
who we are and what we do with each other. I want my illustrations
to unite us as a tribe, letting every fag know that he belongs,
that he is welcome, and that he is not alone.
I've been
criticized for not drawing “pretty” men, but I believe that old,
fat, ethnic, plain, disabled, and unusual queers exist and are
equally deserving of being depicted and recorded for gay history.
Not only the hyper-attractive have sex; there is a wide range of
men and boys outside of the “Tom of Finland” mold that are
fantastic and imaginative sex partners. I'm interested and
intrigued by them all, and determined to include them in my body
of work.
I like to
record the responses and reactions men have to each other. A cock
being shoved in an ass is pretty meaningless without the
accompanying thoughts revealed through the characters' faces. I
want mobile, flexible features that betray the mind's inner
workings, bringing a real psychological subtext to the scenario.
Beautiful people often suffer from a form of emotional Botox,
being so
self-aware that they fail to exhibit any honesty in their
expressions. There are plenty of artists recording the “ideal” man
already. This emphasis on masculine beauty promotes a kind of
narcissism that undermines our value as a tribe, reducing us to
boring, narrow-minded, image-obsessed caricatures. We are more
important, relevant, and powerful than such stereotypes suggest,
and I use art to portray this belief.
Though I'm
fairly prolific and widely published, there are no fortunes to be
made in this particular profession. I do it to honor anyone who
has had the courage to thwart society’s strictures and conventions
by taking another man's dick in his hands. I do it for all those
who won't accept the roles assigned to them, for those who defy
the proscribed “reality” and have the courage to forge their own.
— Michael Kirwan
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