About Ali Farzat and Women's Bodies

One of the arguments put forward by the Syrian artist, Ali Farzat, in defense of the caricature in which the body of a member of the opposition coalition was used for the latter’s “criticism” and its performance, is that naked bodies are spread as models in most museums and galleries in the world. This argument, through which Farzat, who sparked a storm of controversy and criticism, wanted to transfer the controversy from masculine behavior in looking at women's bodies as a "disgrace" that can be used in political battles and harming opponents, to defending art and the freedom to paint the naked body. In this tactic, he benefited from a good number of conservatives who objected to the drawing, simply because it embodies the woman's body, and not because he views it from a derogatory angle, and uses it as a sign of poor political performance.

Although a number of conservatives launched an attack on Farzat, they do not differ with him much, especially with regard to the woman's body. Both parties despise this body, but one of them wants his contempt to remain hidden and does not come out in public, and our legislator is within a value system, and another wants to use his contempt in political battles, and to circumvent it by defending the freedom to paint nudity. The latter, indeed, deserves to be defended, but when artists make it in times of complex radical transformations, and art was a part of it.

The art of nudity developed from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, that is, during the European Renaissance, and this coincided with new intellectual conceptions about the body, making it more sensual, and giving its owner the right to own it. It is obvious that Farzat's masculine behavior is completely separate from this context, in defending nudity in art, he defends nudity with a vulgar logic, separating the artistic value from its history, and putting it in a path that reflects its content. Against opponents, even his practice of drawing caricatures, does not mean the adoption of the values ​​​​of this art and its affiliation with the course of its historical development, especially the mockery of authority. He mocked the political authority represented by the coalition, but he fell into the trap of the socio-religious authority, which confiscates women's bodies, and considers them a weapon in political battles. This is not a contradiction, as much as it is an incomplete affiliation with art, which refers the latter, to the exact opposite of its function, as happens in the use of the question of nudity.

In clearer language, masculinity hides behind the defense of the right to paint nudity and the contempt of women's bodies and their use to discredit opponents, as well as behind the art of caricature, which is used only as a technique, and separate from its goal of dismantling the prestige of all powers. The irony is that those who are criticized by Farzat, i.e. members of the coalition, use politics as a technique, separate from its values ​​and the course of its historical development, just as he does with art, as there is no importance for pluralism, management of difference and the transfer of power, within the opposition institutions, politics in them, a struggle for positions, and commitment With agendas of supporters, and sham elections. No attempt was made to establish political traditions, norms and values. Hence, this fluidity can be explained in the transition of some from loyal to the regime to opposing it, without any little review. Farzat himself is not far from this fluidity, as any auditor in his history knows.

There is more than masculinity, in the case of Farzat, this is just a result.. The most important issue is the practice of a number of Syrians as techniques that are disconnected from the path of their moral formation, even some jurists, you may find them in many cases, speaking in a language that kills the other morally and abuses it. How can the Syrian build a new relationship with his role, so that this role does not become a performance and a technique to bring out the worst in it of masculinity, dictatorship and contempt for the other, so that the artist, politician and jurist all belong to the values ​​and historical roles they play, postponing the answer to this question will make Farzatism take root more , not only in the art of caricature, but in all areas of the exhibition space.