Of Pain and Pleasure

‘Tokyo Hotel Story’ is a show of photographs by world renowned photographer Nathalie Daoust and is in a word, provocative. The exhibition currently running at Gallery Connexion has attracted a large and diverse crowd, from art and photography lovers to members of the local kink community. The Rick Burns gallery is filled with dozens of large format colour photographs of beautiful Japanese women in full regalia, and surrounded by the tools of their trade as BDSM Dominatrix, including some in 3D.

Daoust spent several months living in a ‘love hotel’ in the middle of Tokyo in the city’s most famous S&M hotel, the Alpha In. While there, she photographed 39 women in their professional trade of Dominatrix, in full costume, in their private rooms. Love hotels as a phenomena became popular in Japan in the 1960s. Hotels offer elaborately themed rooms available for a 3 hour ‘rest’ or an overnight stay mainly for the purpose of having sex. Some hotels simply offer a private space for couples to fulfill their fantasies. The Alpha In, one of the most famous hotels in Tokyo, specializes in providing BDSM services. For a fee, a customer can hire a Mistress who specializes in Bondage and Domination or Sado/Masochism. In Japan, Mistress is a recognized trade and the women who work the hotel have undergone formal training in skills such as rope bondage, whipping techniques that leave no mark (or the opposite should the customer desire) and the cleaning and maintenance of their tools and equipment.

Every day for 4 months Daoust shot 2-3 rolls of 35mm film for each girl she interviewed. It took her nearly a year to develop and print her images in a specialty Kodak colour processing lab in Australia. She has a long history of photographing both prostitutes and hotels, with over 50 solo shows and many group shows to her name. In her 1997 solo debut she photographed the Carleton Arms Hotel in New York City in ‘New York Hotel Story’, which was developed into a full colour coffee table book documenting the rooms of the hotel which are decorated by famous artists such as Banksy. She also spent time in a brothel in Brazil taking portraits of aging prostitutes who were fighting for recognition from the government for their right to social security, health care benefits and access to pension money.

Daoust says the 2-3 hours she spent with a Mistress was primarily to learn and talk with them about their hopes, dreams, family and living situation. Conversation was punctuated with her camera and the girls mostly posed themselves. Using long and double, even triple exposures and taking advantage of available light, Nathalie successfully conveys the atmosphere surrounding the Mistress and her work room. Special dark room and printing techniques further enhance the sense of fantasy and beauty, highlighting the hotel’s purpose of escapism via sexual adventure. The 3D portion of the show is much less ethereal and far more practical. Here she shows the dungeons and cells available for a session with a Dominatrix. In these rooms padded chairs with shackles, chains, rope and torture tools are freely used. No people populate these photos and the sense is that the 3D portion of the show is documentary, whereas the large colour photos of the Doms in costume is all about fantasy.

She says the reason behind this project was to satisfy her own curiosity, to debunk her prejudice toward sex workers in the BDSM trade and to continue her “exploration into female sexuality and the subversion of gender stereotypes.” When asked if she was attempting to present her subjects as empowered women breaking free of the “passive beauty” that dictates Japanese culture, she responded that the viewer must decide for themselves how to interpret the images – as passive or powerful. She says, “There’s a fine line between discriminating and empowering, but this is what I saw, this is what I lived – I just want to show this moment in time. You can see it however you wish I just wanted to document it.”

‘Tokyo Hotel Story’ runs until March 2. You can find images from the show, as well as her past projects, at http://www.daoustnathalie.com/ Gallery Connexion is located at 440 York St. and can be contacted at galleryconnexion.ca

A Daughter's Eulogy

Here is a picture of my dad: Bundled in dark plaid, hunter orange toque, whiskers and hair slightly unkempt because "it's warmer fer ma ears that way!" driving Garf the Tractor to the woods to cut logs and drag them home. Snow everywhere, breath fogging, he and the dog warm themselves by the wood stove.
Here is another picture of my dad: Christmas morning sleeping in just to drive us kids crazy, instant coffee and sweets for breakfast and he was almost, if not more, excited for presents than we were. I remember him being so delighted and proud to haul all the gifts from their hiding places to put them under the tree on Christmas Eve, the pure excitement and joy on my daughter's face, and the feeling of complete family love and belonging on all those Christmas mornings.
Dad showed his love in different ways. Ours was not a house with a lot of hugging or verbal "I love you"s and actually, he spent a lot of the time away for work or in the garage fixing small engines, building something, watching the hockey game or listening to music. In fact, the garage was his home as well as in the house with us. Lazy boy chair, TV, radio, cold beer, warm fire - what more could you want?
He showed his love by doing. My father was a doer. It took me a long time to figure out his language, but here is a page from our book: a personal alarm system when I first moved to Toronto at 18 years old meant "You are my baby girl and I know what a scary world this can be. If anything happens to you, I will blame myself." A fire extinguisher and smoke alarms for birthday presents told me "I love you and want to protect you." And when my daughter Georgia was born child proofing and safety precautions were taken to an all new level because now he had two important girls to look after.
The relationship between my father and daughter has been a very special and beautiful one. Georgia has no biological father figure in her life and so my dad naturally stepped up to fill those shoes. Their love for each other is so obvious and so joyous to anyone who saw them together; she was like a second daughter to him and he was more than a grandfather to her. He taught her how to gut fish, rank wood, tend a garden, drive a truck and tractor, paint, build and fix anything and I can see how his guidance has helped shape her into the little person she is. The loss of my father Charles will be profound for my baby G.
For my brother Cory I can see clearly how our dad is living on through him. My brother's quiet strength, willingness to work hard and step up to help take care of us are traits he learned from our father, whether he likes it or not. I imagine the father/son relationship to be not as easy as it looks. Two strong opinionated men with the common goal of loving their people and making a good life - but often with very different ways of making that happen.
I want to be honest in this account of my father's life and by doing so, honour him. He was definitely not perfect and perhaps being the daughter he fiercely protected has coloured the mark he's made on me. But isn't that how lives are lived? Many men contained in one - father, brother, partner, friend.
Each of you knew him in a special and unique way. Each of you has been impacted and shaped by your experience of him as we bump and grind and jostle our way through relationships daily, that over time make us who we are.
Dad was somebody I looked up to without even knowing it. He was my measuring stick - be it some aspect of him I aspired to or one I wanted to avoid. We had a rocky relationship through my teen years and early adulthood, but I always knew I could count on him to rescue me, I could always count on him to keep me safe.

Thank you to everyone who loved him so hard, especially my mother, brother and his sisters, Lois and Hazel. You have wrapped our family in your arms and cared for us. And now, I guess, we say goodbye and see ya later Charlie.

Here is a memory from my dad: six years old and learning to swim, his big steady hands under my belly as I paddle my arms and kick my feet. He gently takes his hands away and I am on my own.

This Love Business

Should I feel ashamed of my strength, my toughness, the tenacity that has saved my life again and again? Should I be embarrassed of the events and circumstances that have brought me to this place in my life? Should I feel less than beautiful because other people have told me that's what I am?
The trouble with being tough is this: how exactly has it damaged me? I know the benefits of being one tough bitch with a generous shot of dyke thrown in: I've survived mental illness, I'm raising a wonderful and well adjusted child, I have incredible friends and a good relationship with my family. I'm smart and sensitive, empathetic and understanding. I've lifted the weight of the world and not broken in half completely.
The damage, however, is the utter pain I make myself feel when someone else disappoints me. The damage, perhaps, is expecting others to be as tough and awesome as me. And the damage that is done to my heart when I finally let go of the toughness and trust another to love me is like a hot knife in the chest. Fear and pain corrupt me.

Technology and Grief

On the couch at the hospital, clutching my cell phone, mp3 player blasting sad piano notes into my ears, still can't block out the world, still reaching out for comfort but only able to handle it through technological means. What does this say about me and my defenses? I am already crying, if someone touches me tenderly I may dissolve. Reach out only through technological means: can only handle the comfort, removed.

How, how is it that life is so incredible? Mountain highs and valley lows, all in one epic hike. One moment the trail kicks the shit out of you, the next someone is helping you up that steep incline. How can life begin and end simultaneously? How can I feel searing grief and giddy hope at the same moment in my time? So many associations are filing into my head now - the simple act of walking: one foot forward into hope, one foot left back in grief. Same body, same direction, same intent for life.

Pretty ladies, boys and ice cream

Dylan Thomas, Emily Dickinson, The Black Keys, pencil and pen, sketchbook, pretty ladies, boys and ice cream - all my friends today as I tried to soothe myself after visiting my father this afternoon in the hospital. And surprisingly, I was able to make a drawing, a good one. What a sweet, small gift! Maybe my hands remember how after all. I've been so critical and discouraging of those hands. When they don't perform, I get angry - even though I know I haven't exercised my drawing muscles in ages. It's certainly a skill that must be used and used and used, in order to maintain and hopefully, improve drawing skill.

I know this blog has fallen by the way side, but I'm not feeling guilty over it. It serves its purpose when need be. And hey, who reads this stuff anyway?

i carry your heart with me

ee cummings:

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it (anywhere
i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling
i fear
no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet)i want
no world (for beautiful, you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope, or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)