The art of Sleeping handsome

I've been thinking lately about how they're just loads and loads of artwork of young women

I know I'm not the first to think about this

But I was thinking about how even when there are artworks with men in them

The men are often shown as powerful strong Etc even if they are being cruel or victims

But I've seen a lot of artwork of women where we are sleeping

Don't get me wrong

I fully comprehend the practicality of it

The person is already being still for long periods of time

And often they are women that the artist is intimate with and enjoys looking at

But I also find artwork of women sleeping to be incredibly vulnerable and often they appear to be defenseless and fragile in their slumber

But there are just lots and lots of drawings and paintings Etc of women sleeping

I wonder if there will ever be a time when there are as many artworks of men sleeping

Or artworks of grown men showing some sort of vulnerability rather than projections of invincibility or strength

I think that portraying men as sexual is still kind of a new thing in most artwork in Western culture anyway

As most the people making and buying the artwork previously were men that could not openly be gay

I think that fragility and vulnerability are still to be explored in the masculine form

And oftentimes the sexualized masculine form I still from the male gaze being made by homosexual men rather than female artists

I don't think that that is a bad thing

Merely that there should be more variety and exploration that can be done

We don't often see the female gaze in art to do with the human form at all

Most of the artwork that I have seen of men is either biblical, mythical, portraits of rich and powerful men or self-portraits

A lot of the self-portraits depict the Artist as being expressionless or angry

I am no longer making art

At least not what would be considered art in the academic sense

Both because of trauma that I have experienced around the visual arts and because I am ill and having bouts of arthritis in my hands

So for me thinking about the subject is somewhat academic

And not at all something that I am considering planning a project for

It just keeps skipping through my mind from time to time and I felt the need to communicate it