In the Galleries: Eric Lanuit's Orientalism

Provocative? Or simply erotic?

Eric Lanuit's provocative and languid photographs evoke the voluptuousness of the 19th-century's Western viewpoint on the Eastern world. The "European gaze," if there is such a thing, created a stereotype of the Arab man that was exotic and slightly feminized. Lanuit's photographs that depict Middle Eastern men as willing objects for the viewer seem to comprise a particularly brave exhibit in Paris considering recent events. We are left to wonder if these photographs are innocent and erotic, or a poke in the side of a culture that abhors homosexuality.

The exhibit runs March 10-March 31, Les Mots à la Bouche Librairie-Galerie, 6 rue Sainte Croix de la Bretonnerie, 75004 Paris

Eric Lanuit is the founder, publisher, pirector and photographer of Character, Men Addicted, Ayor Magazine, and Narcissus Magazine.