Art Documentary - Cynthia Cohen: "The Shame"

Cohen’s paintings regenerate the historical gaze on the naked female body, forging new connections between the artwork and the viewer. She disrupts the logic of art history by reinventing the relationship between subject and observer, private and public. Her work simultaneously veils and unveils sexuality. The show is curated by Laura Isola, with additional text by Larisa Zmud. Cohen shares that to create these pieces, she had to step out of her “comfort zone” and confront the vulnerability of exposing a family secret. Typically, her process involves searching for internet images, photographing objects, and using toy animals for inspiration. She also draws from plasticine models and digital collages, which she later transforms into paintings. Cohen frequently plays with scale, as seen in her Pan Dulce series, where she referenced her grandfather’s paintings. This time, however, her process evolved. She staged scenes with actors and sets, directing and photographing them. These scenes, steeped in a specific era and theme, explore female eroticism in the 1970s, while also reflecting aspects of her childhood—a sense of the unseen yet palpable. The project delves into the genesis of the idealized, erotic, and forbidden woman. Excerpt from the essay “PORN AND SHAME” written by Larisa Zmud about this new series of paintings by Cynthia Cohen. “If our sex is for pleasure and children, how do we live it? How do we live our sex? We don’t appear naked in this film gratuitously, nor to be ogled. We want to affirm our desires. Pleasure, not perversion; sexuality, not a sex shop.” —Agnès Varda, Réponse de Femmes (1975)