Untitled (left) & Spit, Swallow (right)

(left) In these works, Mithu Sen flouts our notions of not only ‘good woman’ but also of ‘good art.’ Her aggressive sexual imagery is kitschy, garish, and plagiaristic, collaging ready-made fabric and pictures with drawings of her own. What appears to be a crisis in aesthetic taste, however, allows the artist to address a crisis in social norms. Sen uses erotic symbolism to address the subject of power. Her work is about the desire for pleasure and the impossibility of avoiding danger. We see sex not only as pleasure, but ultimately as the pleasure that men and women take in inflicting pain on each other.

(right) Spit and Swallow at first glance are inoffensive, abstract artworks. Drawing closer, we find that the bindis – symbols of female fertility – are sperm-shaped. Male and female fertility symbols are conflated here. We can see these teeming circles as the abstracted representation of an ejaculation, or, given their titles, as referring to pleasures of an oral kind. The bawdy and unambiguous titles contrast with the inoffensive and abstract nature of the artworks themselves, making them simultaneously provocative and innocently playful. Whilst you might be happy to show this artwork to your mother you’d probably rather not tell her the name.