Gay bdsm art by 'mitchmen' Mitchell and other artists featuring male erotic sexy fetish, S&M, men tied up, male bondage, domination, humiliation and spanking. Vintage photographs of men in uniform, Royale & Hussar Studios, humourous captions, gay pride articles
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 has been on a break since January, I am working on it and hope to resume shortly. (see Group News for link)
Link to the Royale Studio Archive in the right sidebar
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
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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
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.
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!)
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.
