Facebook recently announced changes to its policies on what can and cannot be posted in order to combat sexual exploitation. Some criticized the company for policing nudity and content that objectifies women, while others saw it as a necessary move against pervs who use Facebook’s platform to disseminate their smut.
Facebook has started to police its platform for paintings of female nudes. The company is making it harder for artists to sell their work on the platform. Read more in detail here: buy art online.
It almost seems like regulating community standards on Facebook is a joke.
The Barnes Foundation, on the other hand, isn’t laughing. Last month, Facebook rejected a photograph from the show “Suzanne Valadon: Model, Painter, Rebel,” which was held at this educational institution dedicated to art appreciation. It was deemed “inappropriate” by the social networking platform.
What happened to the beef?
“Nude Sitting on a Sofa” is a painting that depicts an artist’s model relaxing between posing sessions. Her top and lower anatomy are both covered by her crossed arms and legs. In practice, the figure is only naked in name.
It’s as though Facebook recognized the artwork’s title without seeing the painting itself. What other explanation is there for the prohibition on nudity when there is none?
Barnes filed an appeal, arguing that the piece is historically significant. (Valadon was the first woman approved into the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts.) Manet, Dore, and Delacroix were among the group’s members.
Facebook’s answer was to link Barnes to a page of policy prohibiting “nudity, portrayals of persons in explicit or suggestive poses, or too suggestive or sexually provocative behaviors.”
The exception is Michelangelo’s David, which is exempt from the regulations. “Nudity in a statue is compliant,” according to Facebook’s standards. Is three-dimensional frontal nudity compliant?
I’m curious whether Valadon’s figure would have received a pass if it had been a monument.
Do you have any strange ideas?
Or do Facebook’s ideas on naked girls in art revolve only around sex? I ask because this isn’t the first time the internet has acted as a policeman when it comes to painting women’s bodies.
A photo I used to accompany a story on Renaissance painter Piero di Cosimo was blocked by Facebook in 2017.
On Eunomia, you may discuss this news.
“A Satyr Mourning Over a Nymph” is a classic Renaissance picture. It indicates a mental state.
Di Cosimo depicts a lone individual grieving the loss of a loved one. The Satyr’s anatomy is veiled, and the only way to see a breast is to look carefully at the nymph’s dead body.
The attention on breasts in both the Di Cosimo and Valadon paintings (and others) brings to mind the scene in the 2010 film “Social Network” in which Mark Zuckerberg retaliated against a female student who had rejected him by insulting her bra size on his website, then known as Facemash.
Is it now a source of embarrassment that he has to follow his own rules?
You’ll note that the picture that illustrates the column you’re reading is merely the head of the artist’s model, who Valadon painted naked. Her facial expression — sad, maybe introspective – tells you she’s not trying to seduce anybody. If Zuckerberg perceives prurience in this image, he is overthinking it.
Valadon began her career as a model for other painters and learnt through observing them. However, she did not depict women as objects in the same manner that other artists did, such as Degas, who painted ladies in their baths – faceless, like Bathsheba without a tale.
Valadon told tales to ladies. Before banning an art book, Facebook should crack it once in a while.
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