Thought this might raise a few eyebrows:

In a review called "Milking It," (The Nation, Oct. 20, 1997), performance
artist Karen Finley's latest work is described.  (Finley is the woman who
stirred controversy a few years back for using government arts grant
money to create a work in which she smeared her body with chocolate
pudding in emulation of excrement).

"She screens a video of herself furiously squeezing her nipples and
squirting breast milk onto a black sheet of paper.  Titling it "Nursing
Painting," she riffs on Jackson Pollack's splatter art. . ."

The reviewer (Laurie Stone) comments approvingly:

"I felt elated by her bravado and by her insight that spurting breast
milk onstage was more of a taboo than bloodletting, p*ssing or perhaps
even sh*tting. . . .   She introduces breast milk into the theater
because, like menstrual blood, it's been relegated to the wings, while
semen (and pseudo-semen) cascades and while blood spilled by a
performance artist such as Ron Athey can take on the triumphal sheen of
social transgression."

So my question is, does Finley's work serve as a comment on the problem
of equating breastmilk with other bodily fluids, specifically bodily
waste, or does she contribute to the problem by reiterating the error of
conflation?

Penny Piercy, LLL Leader
MOM (Patrick 4/6/93 & Sarah 8/7/97), MRS (to Van 7/24/89), MA, MLS,
MiSTie
from Bloomington, IN  <[log in to unmask]>