Part 6 of our essay on fantastical, mythological, and supernatural Muses
The Cheetah Woman: Our Secret Desires and Fetishes
Finally, I want to end this by considering the strange and controversial allure of Aimee Mullins’ part-woman/part-cheetah creature in the five-part film cycle, “The Cremaster Cycle,” produced in the early part of this decade by art world darling (and Bjork’s partner) Matthew Barney. For this films Barney assembled an eclectic cast: Normal Mailer, Ursula Andress, and Barney himself played key (if opaque) roles. Mullins, as she always does, struck an even sharper and more unsettling note, for she is a double amputee. Therefore, when Barney made her two cheetah legs for the third film, in a way he was starting from scratch. Is this the source of her allure? Her danger? There are those who argue that Mullins is exploited (this was especially the case when Alexander McQueen used her as a runway model; he countered by saying she was a stunning beauty, and that’s that – with more profanity thrown in), but I don’t think so. She is a model and an athlete, and she seems more than in control of her remarkable collaborations.
I recall an image fetish photographer Eric Kroll had on his web site of a very young girl (early 20’s probably), innocent-looking, fresh and pretty, and “normal” looking except that she had had one of her legs amputated. He once confided in me that she had received more marriage proposals – through his site – than any of his other models.
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Part 5 of our essay on fantastical, mythological, and supernatural Muses
Contemporary Examples of Half-Female/Half-Beast Sorceresses and Their Familiars
We see people using the disguise of hybrid creatures to kinky effect in the film “Eyes Wide Shut,” which was based on Arthur Schnitzler’s 1920’s novella, “Dream Story.” We all know the scene – that scene, in which the men wear dominoes and masks, the perfectly shaped women only masks, and the result is a phantasmagoric garden of delights of which both Zeus and Pan, I believe, would have approved. We see all kinds of animal or mythic transformations alluded to by the wide variety of masks: Grecian ones and Venetian ones; simple eye coverlets, birdlike masks with brightly colored, proud plumage — even ones that are topped, appropriately enough, with the horns of a satyr.
But we don’t find these kind of fantastic beasts just at literary or cinematic sex parties.
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Part 5 of our essay on fantastical, mythological, and supernatural Muses
Half-Woman/Half-Beast Enchantresses
Finally, I want to look at those creatures whose transformation into something more than the normal mortal/normal human is not shown or stressed in a tale: it does not matter what the hour of the day or night is, these half-female/half-beast mistresses of magic just are. What’s more, some are evil, some are helpful and kind-hearted, but they are usually beautiful and tempting no matter which, spelling disaster if you happen to cross paths with one of the human-beastess hybrids possessed of cunning wiles and wickedness of the soul.
One of the oldest of such hybrid creatures, and one with countless variants in world cultures and religion, is Lilith. Continue reading . . .
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Part 3 of our essay on fantasical, mythological, and supernatural Muses
Nocturnal, Diurnal, and Seasonal Changelings
There is a specific class of changelings that appears in ancient Greek myths, folk tales from around the world, Shakespearean plays, Japanese ghost stories, fairy tales, and modern stories: those creatures that are compelled by spell or their own design to come alive, or be born anew, at the witching hour of midnight. For them, nighttime is their playground, and the nocturnal changes that occur for them are often beyond their control. If no changes occur, they are often creatures who find kinship and comfort with the night: they are most themselves within its velvet embrace. Alternatively, I will also explore a few instances of diurnal changelings, as well as the grandmother of all seasonal time-sharers: Persephone.
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Part 2 of our essay on fantasical, mythological, and supernatural Muses
Sudden, Mythical Metamorphoses
In this first section I would like to consider the sudden transformations we see so many of in Greek and Roman mythology, captured so well in ancient classical texts like Ovid’s Metamorphoses, as well as in some more modern fairy tales. In these stories, abrupt transmutations sometimes serve as a pleasant surprise from a god or goddess – a prayer answered by those fickle deities. As we are discussing muses, it seems fitting to start with the story of Pygmalion and Galatea.
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Part 1 of our essay on fantasical, mythological, and supernatural Muses
Half-Women/Half-Beast Enchantresses and Nocturnal Charmers and Changelings
Throughout world literature and mythology – from ancient Greco-Roman myths to the Grimms Brothers’ fairy tales; from Japanese folk traditions to artists’ renditions of fantastic creatures that are hybrids of humans and something else – people have been endlessly fascinated with the idea of transformation, mythological beings, changelings, human-animal monsters, beasts, or goddesses, and people who act normal by day but turn into another being – or behave under the command of a charm — by night. In many of these myths and stories, one reason for their importance and their persistence in our culture is because those of us “ordinary people” both long for and fear those touched with otherness – a phenomenon that can be as divine as the instant when the priest consecrates bread so as to make it into the body of Christ at Catholic mass, and he feels one with God; or, at the other end of the spiritual spectrum (and hopefully purely fictional) as crude and petty as when an insatiable, vengeful demon-woman turns an innocent man into a pig.
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