"Spaghetti Man"

• This work, entitled, Spaghetti Man, is a work done by Paul McCarthy in 1993 that portrays a doll like creature with a rabbit head and extremely large genitals. The work is made up of several different materials including faux fur, plastic, and polyurethane rubber. It is a three dimensional sculpture that reaches then feet tall. The "penis" measures in at 40 ft. long and coils at the base of the feet. The genitals protrude from the body where a vagina would typically be, and the end of the penis is cut at 90 degrees, showing no sculpted end, but instead an abrupt stop.
• It seems rather difficult to place our finger on what exactly McCarthy is trying to portrait here, but several articles suggest, that, "It has the ironic humor of the fairy tales in which wishes are granted with mischievous results: the desire for a big organ is answered with a monstrous excess." This description is well represented when comparing it to the work itself. The body of a man, with a giant, one-eyed rabbit head seems like something straight out of a Dr. Seuss book or a childhood fairy-tale. The article also suggests that perhaps this is a visual representation of the male obsession with penis size, and that maybe bigger isn't better. The man may have wished for this large penis but it's looks and location seem to be a consequence of a selfish action, almost as if the man was tricked. He got what he wanted but dire consequences occurred as well.
• To be honest, this work is extremely unique, thus the reason it doesn't remind me of many other works we have gone over in class. But if I had to pick one, it would be the work entitle "John and Paula, Sitting Bottomless" by Wolfgang Tillmans. This work comes to mind simply because it is one of the only other sexually explicit and rather revealing pieces of art that stuck in my mind. The genitalia of both works captures your attention, not because we are all perverted, but because it is shocking and intriguing when we see these kind of things that we are not use to seeing in everyday life.
• Primarily I chose this piece of art because I found it extremely interesting. It was shocking but at the same time simple and unique. You could look at it over and over again and still find new ideas and themes that you hadn't noticed before. It is visually stimulating bust also mentally challenging because the meaning behind the work could be so many different things.