THE EROTIC SPACE AROUND ART OBJECTS

For philosophers like Plato, eros is a universal force that can be a vehicle for transforming consciousness towards peace, perfection and divinity. For psychologists like Freud, eros is the life force including the desire to live and thrive, sexual instincts, and basic impulses like thirst and hunger. From mythology, when Eros, the Greek god of love, fell in love, he had to overcome betrayal, envy, cruelty, deceit and even death to be united with his beloved Psyche. Reflecting the power of eros, Eileen R. Tabios in her short story collection, The Erotic Space Around Art Objects, radically eroticizes the “space” for interpreting visual art to create unique and unexpected narratives. The author radiantly shows the subjectivity and passion of aesthetic response in ways that elicit wonder while revealing a restless, multifaceted mind exploring the depths of humanity.

Marianne Villanueva, a short story master and author of Residents of the Deep, says about the collection: “Lush, erotic, feverish, philosophical, hallucinatory, audacious, passionate—this book demands surrender. Every scene is like attending a glittering cocktail party peopled with exotics who thirst for completion, who recklessly deny themselves nothing. Vivid and heartbreaking.”

In addition, Jean Vengua, artist and author of four poetry collections, notes: “Eileen R. Tabios’ stories are not predictable, and they swerve into poetry, even as a musical note might bend into blues. What makes these narratives blue? The fact that love exists, suffers and enjoys, alongside that which is distant, cold, calculating, imperative. ‘Keep your eyes open,’ commands the object of one artist’s desire in the story, ‘Blue Richard.’ In the midst of struggle—in the midst of cultural disjunction, diaspora, and subjection—the artist is drawn to the authoritative voice that makes everything seemingly easy, simple, fluid.”