Project
Untitled (América Latina)
Carlos Motta’s black-and-white photograph Untitled (América Latina) (2016) captures a nude male figure on his knees. He’s facing away from us and while he’s not quite on all fours (his hands, held almost in prayer in front of him suggest he’s hoisting himself up by his forearms), the perspective forces us to focus on his ass. Written across his butt cheeks are the words ‘AMERICA LATINA.’ Like much of Motta’s work, this portrait anchors the sexual in the political. A literal reading of the work – a metaphor image of the continent’s body ready to be fucked – requires one to examine just how much of political rhetoric comes to depend on sexualised bodies. But in making it flesh ‘Untitled (América Latina)’ also reminds you how the body (the queer body in particular) is always at the mercy of the body politic that constructs and marginalizes it.
