Joëlle Circé Laramée labels herself a queer feminist female artist visualizing her own life and experiences in her art. Her erotic work is obviously dominated by women, sometimes with a rather heavy focus on the genitalia, something most erotic artists seem to avoid.
This doesn’t mean I would label her work pornographic, maybe because it’s not so much about the sexual aspect or the explicitness itself. It’s more a personal fascination or maybe even adoration of the feminine form, including the vagina in it’s many manifestations.
In other parts of her oeuvre we see hyper-realistic portraits, like in “Burlesque” ( image nr.3 ). A painting that nearly enters a “kitsch” stage, however the wonderful painting style prevents this from happening. It does show the amazing virtuosity of this artist and it also reveals her fascination for old school masters and the way they handle the light. This is especially visible in the way she paints the flesh, or better how the light touches it. I think this is the best part of her work, you can almost feel the weight of a body and it makes the skin almost touchable.
In some of her work theres quite a dark presence, often linked to the bondage and S&M scene, although not exclusively. The painting titled “Damned” ( image nr.4 ) is a good example of this. It flirts with bondage and caging but you can also read it from an other angle, as the title of the work explains. An intriguing piece, with many layers of communication.
