Messages from the fifth dimension

I myself am a big fan of Anne Geddes...but after reading this article i am starting to have doubts. Not about her work but more about your view. It my very well be that the parents of these babies know what they are putting their babies into. Not everyone thinks of her art as "child porn." I have nothing against your opinion since everyone has their own views, but i would like to say that in my opinion she's bringing a newborns beauty and innocence to life. and that's all there is to it. Unless some people want to twist the concept into something it's not.

Well thank heavens Marina says what I have been waiting for someone besides me to say. Makes me feel less alone in the world! thanks

Anne Geddes has quite a brand/product line there... she is carrying on the fine Victorian tradition of sentimentalizing babies/children. Her pretty, shallow pictures distract us from the horrid lives - and deaths - so many children have.
For more thoughtful disturbing images,check out Ydessa Hendeles' show of teddy bear photos and the "Him" statue - of Hitler.

I have just started researching Anne Geddes for a school photography assignment and I see nothing wrong with any of her pictures. In one example above you comment on the little boy and girl bride and groom kissing... it's just a kiss on the cheek and I think that's cute and innocent. I think she is a very talented artist who is expressing her ideas and making babies and children discover who they are. When they get older, they'll see themselves in photographs and thank Anne for helping them establish their personality and identity.

I don't agree with the writer's opinion at all. Everyone has their opinion but are you seriously saying that you have never put a child in an outfit that they did not want to wear, did their hair when they did not want it done, or any number of things children don't want done. You have never dressed a child up for professional pictures? I think the author of this went overboard on the child-porn theory. All Anne Geddes has done is to capture the innocense of young life. Why does a picture have to say anything. A picture is whatever the viewer makes of it, so that leads me to wonder what is wrong with you not Anne Geddes.

Sunshyne, yes, I am saying exactly that. I honored my daughter's wishes and never dressed her up weirdly. Everything she wore, she wanted to wear. Of course, when she was a baby, she couldn't express a choice, but I never dressed her up like a cow or a dog or some such. Ever. As for professional pictures, again, she wore what she wanted to wear, not something I told her to wear. Though dressing up for professional pictures, in which you are putting on dressier clothing, is just a trifle different from costuming a child like a vegetable or an animal and treating them photographically as though they are such. The only thing I can say about your saying that Anne Geddes captures the "innocence of young life" is that if you think objectifying a child and making it into just another item of furniture, just another decoration for the wall, is innocent, then you are indeed part of the problem we face today and I hope to dear God, for the sake of children everywhere, that you never have anything to do with children. It is that kind of attitude that fueled the events in The Nanny Diaries. As for saying that a picture is whatever the viewer makes of it, I am intrigued by how you can say that. Art has always been about self-expression and making a statement. If you claim that nothing an artist creates has any meaning outside what the viewer brings to it, you certainly are entitled to that opinion, but multiple thousands of artists will be everything from amused to outraged at having their unique visions and expressions so summarily dismissed as not even being there. So are you claiming that Ms. Geddes has nothing to say and that whatever anyone sees in her art arises solely out of the viewer? Certainly each person brings something to the art and interprets it out of their own understanding and experiences, but the basic text and subtext of the art is put there by the artist.

As for Heather, how can dressing an infant up like a cabbage in any way help that child later discover who they are? And how can any outfit, no matter how seemingly cute, if not chosen by that child have any relation to that child's personality and identity? You might as well say that the children in Hitler's concentration camps, in having indelible identification numbers tattooed on their arms, being stripped of their own clothing and made to wear prison clothing, must later thank Hitler for helping them to establish their personality and identity. It may be so, but only in how they dealt with the most horrible and debasing and dehumanizing treatment ever designed by twisted minds. Certainly something that is imposed on a person from without, no matter how it might seem, is not something that is a part of their personality and identity.

I have been writing part of my dissertaion on Anne Geddes and came across this website. I have included an excerpt from my essay - beware - it's long!

Another important twentieth century photographer of children is Anne Geddes. Her work is sold as books, posters, calendars, clothing, toys and wrapping paper across the western world and is hugely popular. Superficially, her images imply a reference to the eighteenth century romantic images of children. However, after scrutiny, it could be argued her images display less romantic Reynolds’ style imagery than they initially appear.

Geddes has created many images featuring unclothed babies whose genitalia is covered with a prop from the background of the photograph. Such an image is featured in her Children of the World series (1997). In this image the two babies are asleep, look peaceful and idyllic; bearing a great resemblance in theme to the eighteenth century romantic children paintings. However, the babies are all lying on their backs, naked, with their genitalia covered with fruit. The fruits in the image are cherries and there are cherries scattered throughout the image. The cherries in the image are both black and red but Geddes has chosen for the cherries placed over the babies to be predominantly red. The image is a dark one and the red berries stand out brightly against the brown tones that the rest of the photograph is made up of. As I mentioned earlier, cherries have long been a symbol of the woman’s hymen, and a ripe red cherry could signify a woman is ready for sex. By choosing cherries as the fruit for this image, Geddes could be suggesting far more than the image first implies. Not only do cherries have the symbolism attached to them; but they are red, like in Millais’ Cherry Ripe. Red often is used to symbolise passion and sexuality, and like Millais’ painting, the cherries in this image could be interpreted in the same way , depending on the viewer.

The images on the homepage for Anne Geddes website (she has a variation of images, www.annegeddes.com/) feature babies. As in most of Geddes images, the children appear genderless due to the genitals being hidden. However, the symbolism differs to Reynolds’ genderless children. The babies in Geddes images are naked, with only their genitals hidden, therefore obscuring their gender. Reynolds’ children are fully clothed and their bodies are almost incidental. The babies on her homepage often lie on, in, or wear bright red roses. According to the Christian Dictionary, a rose is:

“A floral symbol sacred to Venus and signifying love, the quality and nature of which was characterized by the color of the rose. A symbol of purity, a white rose represented innocence (nonsexual) love, while a pink rose represented first love, and a red rose true love… the white rose [symbolized] 'white martyrdom' or celibacy… the thorns of the rose were a reminder of human finitude and guilt, as the roses in the Paradise Garden had no thorns. A thorn-less rose was an attribute of Mary as the Second Eve".
(P.296, Christian Dictionary, from
http://arts.ucsc.edu/Gdead/AGDL/rose.html).

When examining her images from this viewpoint, that is, the Christian viewpoint, from which most western morals, laws and ideals stem, it could appear Geddes is juxtaposing images of babies with symbolism of adult sexuality. However, roses often have other meanings attached to them:

"The rose was dedicated to the goddess of love, that is, to the eternal mystery of the continuity of life”.
(Gabriele Tergit's, Flowers Through the Ages, p46).

Geddes work is certainly equivocal when examined from these two opposing angles. The rose has numerous meanings in western society. If Tergit’s book is to be believed, Geddes employs imagery of babies and roses to communicate the beauty of life and the permanence of it. By aligning babies with the rose, Geddes could be emphasizing their importance and elevating them to ranks of divinity as they represent the continuity of life. This is comprehensible as babies can represent life, as they are the beginning of existence for all of us. If the Christian Dictionary is to be believed, Geddes could be suggesting that we are all sexual beings from birth, and sexuality is not something people realize merely when they develop into the socially accepted age for sex. However, by aligning the roses with nudity, Geddes is influencing further ambiguity onto her images. Nudity, for some, can be difficult to separate from sex. By unclothing the babies and putting them in images with roses covering their genitalia, but not much else, Geddes could be causing the viewer to visualize sex. The baby would therefore be the catalyst for that visualization which could lead to discomfort, if the viewer is aware of the connection. This consequently could prompt the viewers to question themselves. Then, feeling uncomfortable with that, they would possibly turn their attentions to the creator of the image and seek to put blame onto them for their feelings. This could explain why Mann’s images have controversy surrounding them and Geddes do not. Geddes images are so shrouded in stereotypes that are considered endearing that people possibly dismiss all connections their thoughts of sex have with the image or are oblivious to them altogether.

Another possible reason Geddes chose for the babies in these images to be unclothed could be to emphasize the natural state of the body, that being, the state we are all born in. Unclothed we are all virtually the same. By removing clothing, Geddes could be also removing connotations of culture, upbringing, beliefs and differences and enhancing what we all have in common as humans. Therefore, by making them genderless, she is also removing stereotypes society has associated with gender. However, the babies in these images, despite being different races, are obviously western due to the health that exudes from them. That considered, these babies possibly represent continuity of western life, and not necessarily that of the whole of humanity.

I have been writing part of my dissertaion on Anne Geddes and came across this website. I have included an excerpt from my essay - beware - it's long!

Another important twentieth century photographer of children is Anne Geddes. Her work is sold as books, posters, calendars, clothing, toys and wrapping paper across the western world and is hugely popular. Superficially, her images imply a reference to the eighteenth century romantic images of children. However, after scrutiny, it could be argued her images display less romantic Reynolds’ style imagery than they initially appear.

Geddes has created many images featuring unclothed babies whose genitalia is covered with a prop from the background of the photograph. Such an image is featured in her Children of the World series (1997). In this image the two babies are asleep, look peaceful and idyllic; bearing a great resemblance in theme to the eighteenth century romantic children paintings. However, the babies are all lying on their backs, naked, with their genitalia covered with fruit. The fruits in the image are cherries and there are cherries scattered throughout the image. The cherries in the image are both black and red but Geddes has chosen for the cherries placed over the babies to be predominantly red. The image is a dark one and the red berries stand out brightly against the brown tones that the rest of the photograph is made up of. As I mentioned earlier, cherries have long been a symbol of the woman’s hymen, and a ripe red cherry could signify a woman is ready for sex. By choosing cherries as the fruit for this image, Geddes could be suggesting far more than the image first implies. Not only do cherries have the symbolism attached to them; but they are red, like in Millais’ Cherry Ripe. Red often is used to symbolise passion and sexuality, and like Millais’ painting, the cherries in this image could be interpreted in the same way , depending on the viewer.

The images on the homepage for Anne Geddes website (she has a variation of images, www.annegeddes.com/) feature babies. As in most of Geddes images, the children appear genderless due to the genitals being hidden. However, the symbolism differs to Reynolds’ genderless children. The babies in Geddes images are naked, with only their genitals hidden, therefore obscuring their gender. Reynolds’ children are fully clothed and their bodies are almost incidental. The babies on her homepage often lie on, in, or wear bright red roses. According to the Christian Dictionary, a rose is:

“A floral symbol sacred to Venus and signifying love, the quality and nature of which was characterized by the color of the rose. A symbol of purity, a white rose represented innocence (nonsexual) love, while a pink rose represented first love, and a red rose true love… the white rose [symbolized] 'white martyrdom' or celibacy… the thorns of the rose were a reminder of human finitude and guilt, as the roses in the Paradise Garden had no thorns. A thorn-less rose was an attribute of Mary as the Second Eve".
(P.296, Christian Dictionary, from
http://arts.ucsc.edu/Gdead/AGDL/rose.html).

When examining her images from this viewpoint, that is, the Christian viewpoint, from which most western morals, laws and ideals stem, it could appear Geddes is juxtaposing images of babies with symbolism of adult sexuality. However, roses often have other meanings attached to them:

"The rose was dedicated to the goddess of love, that is, to the eternal mystery of the continuity of life”.
(Gabriele Tergit's, Flowers Through the Ages, p46).

Geddes work is certainly equivocal when examined from these two opposing angles. The rose has numerous meanings in western society. If Tergit’s book is to be believed, Geddes employs imagery of babies and roses to communicate the beauty of life and the permanence of it. By aligning babies with the rose, Geddes could be emphasizing their importance and elevating them to ranks of divinity as they represent the continuity of life. This is comprehensible as babies can represent life, as they are the beginning of existence for all of us. If the Christian Dictionary is to be believed, Geddes could be suggesting that we are all sexual beings from birth, and sexuality is not something people realize merely when they develop into the socially accepted age for sex. However, by aligning the roses with nudity, Geddes is influencing further ambiguity onto her images. Nudity, for some, can be difficult to separate from sex. By unclothing the babies and putting them in images with roses covering their genitalia, but not much else, Geddes could be causing the viewer to visualize sex. The baby would therefore be the catalyst for that visualization which could lead to discomfort, if the viewer is aware of the connection. This consequently could prompt the viewers to question themselves. Then, feeling uncomfortable with that, they would possibly turn their attentions to the creator of the image and seek to put blame onto them for their feelings. This could explain why Mann’s images have controversy surrounding them and Geddes do not. Geddes images are so shrouded in stereotypes that are considered endearing that people possibly dismiss all connections their thoughts of sex have with the image or are oblivious to them altogether.

Another possible reason Geddes chose for the babies in these images to be unclothed could be to emphasize the natural state of the body, that being, the state we are all born in. Unclothed we are all virtually the same. By removing clothing, Geddes could be also removing connotations of culture, upbringing, beliefs and differences and enhancing what we all have in common as humans. Therefore, by making them genderless, she is also removing stereotypes society has associated with gender. However, the babies in these images, despite being different races, are obviously western due to the health that exudes from them. That considered, these babies possibly represent continuity of western life, and not necessarily that of the whole of humanity.