bananapeppers:

bananapeppers:

he was charged with kidnapping and seducing a minor who was either 12 or 13 (please note that seduction is used differently now than it was then: here it refers to a man’s coercing a woman or girl into having PIV sexual contact with him), and he used “very young local girls” as models for his nudes (which he futher presented as nude paintings of young girls), which was the reason for his ostracization from Český Krumlov!

the Egon Schiele Museum Tulln’s site changed URLs since I posted the above over a year ago. the text at the new page (under “The Neulengbach affaire”) is somewhat different, more euphemistic and more defensive of him, and even so the museum in his honor still mentions his pedophilic behaviors.

even some of his defenders, such as art critic Ken Johnson writing for the New York Times in 2005, don’t deny that he was an art-world child pornographer. and Girl Museum founder Ashley E. Remer points out that another of his defenders—who does not deny some of his actions, instead more generally denying the pedophilia of pedophilia to excuse him and his contemporaries from it (her argument: everyone was a pedophile, and therefore no one was a pedophile)—is invested in trading in Schiele’s works as the author of his catalogue. identifying Schiele’s pedophilia as pedophilia could hurt Jane Killar’s career, as she has made a career in the trading of one man’s works which include child porn. this knowledge isn’t secret enough to call an open secret.

as he depicted “lesbian” sexual intimacy and these works are some of the most accessible (the most hyped, the most prioritized) depictions of “lesbian” sexual intimacy located in the visual arts, his works circulate constantly among lesbian and bi girls and women who may know him only as a source of “lesbian” imagery and who may know few other sources of lesbian imagery in the visual arts. it is comprehensible and unallowable how and why we are directed to his and other exploitative men’s works and not-directed to lesbians’ and bi women’s works depicting sexual intimacy between (adults who are) women—nor to lesbians’ and bi women’s works depicting other aspects of our total lives. I recommend resources such as, but not limited to, @lesbianartandartists, and as far as tips for identifying red flags are concerned (because there are and will be other Schieles), I caution us (myself included) against following the deeply installed inclination to rely on men to represent us. men who fetishize lesbianism are not reliable mirrors for us.

I want more of us to see better that pedophilia, misogyny, and homophobia do not coexist accidentally.