Apples and Oranges?

[gordonzola]

Under-appreciated mural: Haight St. Whole Foods (NOT affiliated with the mega-chain) has a lovely fruit mural above the registers. A number of peaches (I think) are washing themselves in some kind of institutional shower facility. You know, school gym, health club, something like that. Anyways, they’re scrubbing themselves with long-handled brushes (How hard on their tender little skins!) while a carrot blow dries its carrot top, other veggies preen and assorted fruit looks on lasciviously.

It’s tricky to interpret. It has the classic feel of the homoerotic mural (e.g. Rolling Pin Donuts on Church and 24th) and it’s obviously "fruity". But are we supposed to assign gender to the produce? They’re pictured in a traditionally uni-gendered setting, and no bees lurk nearby, not even peeping through a hole in the wall.

But what does one make of the way the apple eyes the closest scrubbing peach? It becomes confusing when one is confronted with the traditional truism about "apples and oranges". If they are "opposites" then how can it be homoerotic? If they aren’t "opposites" than what are they doing in the same locker room? Maybe it’s a pro-polyamory mural, calling into question the whole concept of genderizing love and sex?

Or maybe it’s just supposed to mean their produce is really clean.

Comments

jeanette winterson

[mazette.livejournal.com]

'oranges are not the only fruit'..

maybe she painted that mural.

[ex-dirtylaun442.livejournal.com]

i adore you.

peachy murals

[queen-beeanna.livejournal.com]

Here in Seattle there is a bus ad campaign for peaches. the first time I saw it I burst out laughing! It depicts the image of a young man and woman standing side by side in the midst of a summer meadow, arms outstretched towards a pair of peaches who appear to be frolicking towards them. The man is kneeling down, the lady's golden hair is flowing in the wind...The peaches are HUGE, as in if they were really running lovingly and headlong towards the couple with eager outstretched arms, said couple would be squarshed like the icky Aunt in James and the Giant Peach.
Reallly, its somehow mildly erotic in nature as well, what with its soft focus lense, the placement of the peaches side by side and somewhat overlapping, and the whole "Summers Eve" feel.

Re: peachy murals

[jactitation.livejournal.com]

Mmm, peaches....

Hey, it's okay. If they did run towards them enough to roll over them, it would be the peaches that got squashed. Forget James and the giant one; last night when I was making a peach crisp, I dropped the bag of 9 gorgeously overripe peaches on the floor, and only about 3 feet (I'm short). I swear to god, in seconds I had about a cup and a half of peach juice. They just went to smush hell. That couple might be coated in peach pulp and peach juice, but they'd be okay. Don't worry about them anymore. As for Roald Dahl, well, he was writing about English peaches. Ick.