Charles Cohen

April 7, 2005 - April 30, 2005

Cohen’s evocative series, Buff, uses abstracted images of pornography to manipulate the sense of viewer participation versus observation, and to make the viewer aware of conditioned response and preconceptions. The pornographic elements are removed from the image frame, and replaced with simple white. By denying the image its original function, a void replaces what ought to be present, or rather, what is expected. He writes, “Buff does not have to be based on pornography , but because its intended function is simple and explicit – to entertain the voyeur – it is thus easily manipulated. Ironically, it is because pornography suggests participation that we can observe the phenomenon of stimulation in a more heightened fashion. This is the process of abstraction.”