Stephen Ripley

The Exploited Nude Stephen Ripley

At the present time the first visual encounter of the mature female nude in contemporary culture is dominated by the pornographic image or photograph, which has overwhelmed all other forms of representation available to anyone with internet access. The purpose of this collection of my artistic work is to explore the pornographic representation of the female form to discover if, by intention or accident, it can yield an artistic statement. And to engage with the often brutal, crude and superficiality of the pornographic image and to see if, by the transfer into prime colour, abstraction and exaggeration of shape, a new aesthetic can be released.