Sculptor Charles Ray once told me that he obtained Sears mannikins to use in his art. He discovered that these mannikins, used in all Sears stores were designed to a "Sears Standard" that became an industry standard as well. However, the mannikins did not conform to usual human measurements. Many liberties were taken in size and proportions of the make, female, and child mannikins. So in the days when Sears stores were ubiquitous, and millions of people bought Sears clothes because they liked the way they looked on Sears mannikins, they were not seeing those clothes on true to life human anatomies. The same is still true and especially so with fashion ads. I once had students measure ads for actual human proportions and they discovered that nost female fashion ads were radically distorted. So, what about all of this and your statement that people normally react against human anatomical distortions? Taste can become so normalized that it's not even recognized as favoring distortions, as in the Sears Standard and in perspectival systems. When taste first became an issue, it meant the discernment of beauty. If you had good taste you could discern beauty and beauty was the synthesis of the ideal and the real.
WC > the viewer's > reaction of surprise or disgust is driven by an > innate "taste" to > prefer a normal human shape, and not a disfigured or > misshapen one. > But even so, such disgust is driven by a reaction > that is not > specifically a "visual art" matter of taste, but > rather is a > fundamental, survival-level reaction. > > > | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | > Michael Brady > [EMAIL PROTECTED]
