To my readers......

SITE UPDATE NOTICE

Thanks for visiting mitchmen, home of Mitchell's Gay Art

The Caps and Collars/ Flat Cap Gang story at Google Groups is on a summer break until July. (see Group News for link)

Message updated 25th June 2023

Saturday 23 April 2016

Sailor Beware! (from B&G)


 Another classic bondage scene by Bound and Gagged
A sailor on the town in full dress is not a common bondage subject
surprisingly so given the head-turning attractions of the uniform.


There's a sophisticated sexiness about this fully clothed series.
I love the authentic, neck-enhancing haircut and slightly glum look
As though he thinks he's seen the last of his wallet.


 How can a row of buttons and a flap look sexy?
Well they do and who could resist tackling them?


With buttons undone and flap down, a very nice tight package is revealed
tantalisingly peeking over the top of the lowered trousers


Unfortunately white underwear is vulnerable to glare in informal photography
but close up, the mound close is still enticing.  Yum, eat me, eat me!
(Is that regulation underwear?)


And the contents do not disappoint
Navel undress - eyes to the left


Full Nelson - England expects every man to do his duty.
The rope ties on the wrists look exceptionally  secure in this shot.

You can see more of model Austin Edwards at Bob Wingate's blog 
which is crammed with other B&G photo sets you didn't know you knew.

There's also more in my Tribute to "Bound and Gagged" Magazine series of articles.

The title of my article is taken from Etienne's well known 'Sailor Beware' series about two sailors who are plied with drugged drinks in a Middle Eastern bar and kidnapped to be sold into slavery. 

For more posts on sailors click on the 'sailors' label below
or see 'In Praise of Sailors' series

Tuesday 19 April 2016

Chinese Bondage

 We tend to think of elaborate bondage as being a Japanese art 
but the curiously named BJTriplex blog shows the Chinese also know their ropes.


Nice photography too. This image of a restrained, young man waiting by a neat, freshly made bed is full of possibilities. He shows total submission but this scene is devoid of any suggestion of sleaze. He knows this experience will be a classy one with meticulous attention to detail.


This unusual angle turns our attention to him.
How does he feel, trapped inside this web of ropes?
Is he having second thoughts?


Now we see how his arms are pulled back tightly.
His entire body is enclosed - but not covered.
His head dips in resignation.


It begins.
His legs are folded back and secured.
Soon they will begin to ache - like his arms already do.
 There's no chance of escaping now.


His eyes are covered so he cannot see what is to happen to him.
A ball gag fills his mouth muffling his cries and gasps.
Which begin as the man who has him today asserts his control.
Already he is purring with pleasure over the neatly trimmed pubes
 and perfect proportions of the young man's cock.  
A good choice.


In time he will deliver up his milky man juice.
But first there are more knots to tie, ropes to tighten.
They must be allowed do their work.
There will be much helpless struggling and pleading to savour
in the hours ahead.

It will be a long night.

~

More splendid bondage images at BJTriplex blog

Saturday 16 April 2016

Ulf Retrospective - 2006

Ulf’s output was just as prolific in 2006 as in 2005. My collection of his images from this year, purely compiled from examples which have come my way, runs to 150 pictures.

1
 

Ulf - (title not known)

A goodly proportion of these works are his continued explorations of fantastical worlds with naked men marooned on islands or wandering through bizarre landscapes and magical woods where be-winged creatures (male fairies?) wistfully pine amongst over-sized mushrooms. These works are imaginative and artfully crafted suggesting man being at one with nature, but they are also often imbued with a sense of loneliness and isolation. In this example the interaction with the landscape seems to become disturbingly physical while the gloomy half-light seems to be the harbinger of a mighty storm.


2

Ulf - Get your ass over here

In any year Ulf is much preoccupied with portrayals of men as idealised, strong and sexual creatures, but it’s usually in pin-up style, admiring from a distance. This portrait of a GI however has a more intimate quality. Ulf’s world does not consist of universal prettiness but this man’s mature face is full of character and lends his muscular, hairy body a sort of unthreatening softness and welcoming warmth that makes the peremptory instruction of the title seem quite playful. The anatomy is exaggerated but in a controlled way and the rendering of the jockstrap is very convincing.


3

Ulf - It just keeps gowing Doc

Speaking of exaggeration, gargantuan cocks were a favourite device of Tom of Finland and he liked to show them attracting a crowd of youthful admirers. Ulf’s take on the same idea causes mystification and rather unprofessional embarrassment. But how cool is the patient here? He looks out to us with smug satisfaction rather than the anxiety you might expect from the title, as though confident that this organ is going to be a passport to success in life. 


The product on the table in the foreground seems to challenge the medic to take the problem in hand. I’m not familiar with the packaging but I imagine it’s a recognisable product to Americans and I’d be interested to know the connection Ulf seems to be making here. 


There are some curious swirls and stripes in the sheets and the medic’s clothing, it seems to be an experiment in depicting creases and you’ll see it in other images included here too. There’s some nice shadowing on the medic’s shoulders but his trousers are less successful, turning into a bit of a spray-on job below the knee.


4

Ulf - Ready for more?

This is one of Ulf’s best known images from 2006 and you can see why it gets reproduced a lot. Here we have a cute, young soldier up before one of his NCO’s, a man who is older and bigger but not particularly attractive. The title seems to imply a sort of initiation-cum-brat-taming going on and the soldier’s hand-wrapping is intimidating. You also sense his oversize cock is expecting more than simple admiration this time. It’s not quite clear whether the liquid dripping from the captive’s face is sweat, spit or something else. 


In this picture Ulf seems to capture the sense of unchallengeable institutional power that we saw in the “Guys in Uniform” (GIU) series I revisited recently. Oddly enough when Ulf produced his own direct adaptation of a GIU image (also in this year) he seemed to dispense with this subtlety.


The tap on the wall makes up a symbolic penile threesome with the two protagonists like a cock in a glory hole wanting participation without commitment. I suppose we are looking at our own reflections in a way here or perhaps Ulf is just underlining how this situation is so sexy that even inanimate objects want to join in.


5
 

Ulf - I'll be right with you
 
There’s normally a ‘predicament’ scene in Ulf’s work and this one has a satisfying subtlety and simplicity. In a vast, bare and very clinical room, the bound subject stands to attention before a stool with handcuffs lying on the seat on the one side and, on the other, a red box that we recognise from other pictures as a portable electrical power device. There’s a nice symmetry in the scene and a precariousness about his pose that seems to underline his situation. Although he is only restrained by the arms it seems like there’s no place for him to go in this empty space. Alone with these instruments he can only contemplate what lies ahead.

 6

Ulf - Morning Wood #3
 
There’s sensitivity of a different kind in ‘Morning Wood’ which is another exploration of the sequenced picture story format by this artist. This set is more narrowly focussed than ‘Dangerous Marine’ and ‘Buddy System’, simply following a young marine waking up and then going to the toilet to empty his bladder and beat off. This is almost Turner Prize territory in its sparseness of content but the opening images like this one are beautifully observed and depicted sensitively and romantically. That atmosphere evaporates when the marine enters the bathroom which is cold and crude. The final images are bleakly functional. This transition from dreamy sentimentality to the banal is insightful in some ways, but something of an anti-climax visually.


7
 

Ulf - Clean it good, there's more
 
Ulf did not neglect his political interests in 2006 either. This earthy scene acquires a different dimension when you read the notice on the toilet door. The kneeling figure remains dressed in his spiv-like, best clubbing clothes (his undercover disguise?) which makes his cleaning chore seem all the more inconvenient. 

The man dominating him is portrayed with a heroically muscular torso and a determined face, totally in control. His camouflage gear belongs to a gay stereotype of a more hardened kind than policemen expect to deal with. This image warms the cockles.


8
 

Ulf - Only I can help you
 
This is one of my personal favourites. The restraint position of the captive is erotically well-tuned and leaves him sitting uncomfortably exposed. His erection tells us he's ready to enjoy his partner's attentions. Its relatively normal proportions confer a frisson of realism. The title of this piece is somewhat puzzling, it sounds like the mind games of an interrogator in the movies, impressing on his captive the advisability of spilling the beans before he is passed on to someone less considerate. However, the visual image seems to be more of a dungeon roleplay aimed at bringing about a spillage of a different sort.


9
 

Ulf – Another Keeper


This idea harks back to the 2005 “Can I Keep Him?” image and there are others in 2006 where a particularly succulent man is carried off, destined for a protracted period of amusement with his collector. Drawn purely from the imagination, Ulf has managed to inject a tingling element of unreformed redneck into the collector. 

The petrol pump attendant with his slinky, sprayed-on overalls, open to the waist and failing to conceal a huge dick is an extraordinary, gender-blurring contrast. It’s as though it’s his job to stand there enticing passing motorists. He leans seductively on his pump watching the removal with complete unconcern as though it’s regular occurrence in this neck of the woods. 

Many gay men fantasise about earthy, dominant lovers and we all have our dreams about objects of desire which seem beyond our reach. Ulf’s playful resolution of the quandary as a boy’s game must have wide appeal

.

10
 

Ulf - Take a whiff
 
I couldn’t claim this article to be a representative sample of Ulf’s 2006 work without including an image simply depicting the enjoyment of sex. Older men teaching the younger men a thing or two seems to be the standout theme of this year’s pictures and you can see the similarity of the well-used jockstrap on the left to that worn by the mature GI in picture 2 above. Compare the realistic way it is drawn with the one on the right which shows the artist’s style evolving.


This typically sleazy setting and could easily be what’s at the rear of the filling station in the previous picture. However, despite the folded arms there’s nothing sinister going on here just the physical attractions of maturity being recognised for a change and these two can hardly believe their luck.



series to be continued
(To read these articles from the beginning start with Ulf Retrospective - 2000

Ulf has a blog The Ulfian which is an interesting mix of his art, political comment and selected porn.
There's also an Ulfian fan club on Google Groups which you have to join (but it's free). 


Saturday 9 April 2016

Ulf's Weird Punishment

While researching the next post in my Ulf Retrospective series yesterday I was amazed to rediscover this image, which connects directly to my "Weird Punishment" set just posted.

Guys in Uniform - Ulf Style

 I don't think there is very much doubt that this picture was inspired by the "Guys in Uniform" image below.
Ulf has made some significant changes, the most important being to convert the looming threat of stinging punishment into an overt act, creating a scene reminiscent of his early 'angry' work.

At the same time he's also made the prisoner more comfortable
by giving him a raised platform to lie on, compare the stressed, grovelling original below.

I sense Ulf's giving the captive the 'Heroic American' treatment here.
The original's a Brit of course.

"Guys in Uniform" Original Image

Ulf made numerous other modifications,
polishing up physiques and clothing and substituting new fetish iconography for old.
His trademark background detailing helps bring the scene to life.

There are pluses and minuses for me, but you can judge for youself
how this makeover compares to the original.

You can view more of the "Guys in Uniform" originals from this series at GIU7

Ulf is not the only artist to be inspired by "Guys in Uniform" imagery,
see my A-Z article on Harry Bush  (yes the bikini boys man!)

Tuesday 5 April 2016

Weird Punishment - Epilogue



Some of you may have recognised the Weird Punishment images as being from an old series published by "Guys in Uniform" Studio back in the 70's. "Guys in Uniform" was descended from Basil Clavering's "Royale Studio" with some of the same participants involved in both set-ups. "Guys in Uniform" was even more short-lived and only slightly less notorious for it's attempts to portray the artistry of Erotic Military Punishment.

This set scaled new heights in this department invoking iconography from the dark world of rubber fetish and mixing it with symbols of recent dictatorships for added intimidating effect. This provides a perfect, confusing backdrop for the unfortunate, young hero of the story whose erotic charms are deftly displayed in a succession of tableaux as he plays the helpless pawn of these ruthless exploiters. (This model also appears in another GIU series dressed as a sailor).

The original images in my collection have all been copied from magazines and suffer from excessive greyness and lack of clarity. In my amateurish efforts to 'improve' this I stumbled across the technique used for 'Weird Punishment" which I thought created some dramatic imagery, bringing out hidden detail and highlighting some of the erotic qualities of the images.

Today material from "Guys in Uniform" studio is hard to find on the web. It's name is not sufficiently distinctive for a search engine to pick out (which is why I'm trying to promote the 'GIU' tag) and it's commonly mis-named as "Men in Uniform" (MIU). It's also confused with Royale Studio from 20 years earlier (understandably given their common ancestry and inspiration). You're most likely to track examples down via this route.

I published a series of articles here in 2010/11 covering 9 different photo sets I had identified from GIU with representative samples of the imagery. This set was amongst them and I have now updated the original article with all the images I have from it, so if you want to see the original pictures that inspired 'Weird Punishment' visit GIU7.

Friday 1 April 2016

Weird Punishment - 3

 8. Condemned
(failing to satisfy)

 9. The Formal Ritual
(solemn and dreamlike ...but) 

 10. The Bite of the Cane
(is quite real - and there's no escaping from it)

 11. Returned To The Cells
(to prepare for next time)

The End

Read this article from Part 1