by Marlena Donohue
As to the pictures themselves, the scenes seem very ordinary. Many boys look less like prostitutes than homesick college kids (eg., William Charles Everlove) who got on the wrong Greyhound. Are we witnessing the persona that the gay men sell diCorcia to get their 40 bucks, or a social statement about innocence lost? Or are we simply given a fantasy completely of the artist's own making? In true conceptual fashion, Hollywood Pictures raise more queries than they answer.
DiCorcia does give you a hint, though, as to where he is headed. First, he adds to images the name tags of rap sheets followed by the price he paid, intimating artifice. Then he borrows the tricks of fabricated Hollywood stills--harsh direct lighting, figures reflected on or through surfaces, sultry poses, a distancing between subject and object--to indirectly invite us into a disquieting world most of us would rather not think about. In a way he accomplishes the same thing that another NEA "bad boy," Andres Serrano does--i.e., the images have a certain "in your face, deal with it" erotic edge. But by his very method, di Corcia makes it harder to dismiss this look at Santa Monica Blvd. as mere petulant porn. |