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Magie Noir by Renee Magritte 1932-33

Feb09-06 The painting to the left was uploaded to my personal pictures at Yahoo 360 on the evening of Feb08-06. It was part of an art discussion about an artist who at the age of 14yrs lost his mother to suicide. My blog comment follows:

"The two works by Magritte have a lesser media life and I include them because to me they refer to his mother drowning herself when he was 14 years old. The window with the bust that has blood over the right eye is called "La Memoire". Aside from the blood it's rather cheery. The blue nude is called La Magie Noire is really a wonderful concept of a woman ruled by earthly pleasures and unrestrained emotions whose focus is clouds(castles) in the sky. Again probably a secret commentary about the mental state that lead to his mother killing herself."

These comments reflect how Magritte's work speaks to me. I see nothing objectionable about the nude at all. It is a powerful expression of feminine power.

SO WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?

Evidence

I woke up the next morning to find a message from the Yahoo! 360°Team titled "Your photo has been rejected"

 

Evidence

This is the official notice from Yahoo360 with a basic form response AND then the command: "Please upload a new photo and don't forget to smile."

Then the (understated)
puritanical caution:

"(Note: Do not post photos that contain nudity. Photos with obscene or objectionable content will be denied.)"

Comment-- The pic in question is not a photo of anything alive.It's not a photo at all, it's a painting. These breasts and pubic area are not mine. This is a PAINTING done in 1932-33 by a famous artist of an un-named model. Nudity in art has been around for hundreds of years and is found in Christian religious art as well.

In all fairness to Yahoo I tried to access their Yahoo! 360°photo guidelines with no success at all. I kept receiving the following error message:

Well Perhaps the seuss.yahoo.com server was out to lunch all afternoon. That's special timing because if you can't read Yahoo's guidelines you can't take exception to them.

Perhaps I will have more to say about this in the future; but only after I put together a page of famous nudes in art. Perhaps I can cross reference them with the Yahoo search engine. Do you think?