'flow' 1998/2000      Bikini von Eva Grubinger      Modell: Jan-Holger Mauss
Michaela Göltl

The photographs of Michaela Göltl (1966, Vienna, lives in Vienna and Berlin) who specialises on pictures irritating human habits of perception show the upper part of a body whose physique is more likely male. Its attitude and muscles, emphasised by the contrast of light and shadows, evoke associ- ations to a dancer.

Ribbons round the neck and the chest are identifiable as parts of the top of a bikini made of a sort of transparent fabric with flower ornaments. This piece of clothing disturbs the classical image of a male body and provokes doubts about the obvious categorisation. The picture gets a strange and ambi- guous look, especially because of the unusual ma- terial of the bikini.

A bikini itself is a peculiar piece of clothing because it unveils and sexualises the female body instead of covering it. In this series the transparent bikini on a male body points out this absurdity and questions the common moral standards of our civilisation.