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Mit Gas wrote:A daring piece that might've worked better with showing less of her boobs (like a smaller hole in her chest that shows just a tiny bit of skin instead of blantantly showing those rather huge melons for an eldar) but still, despite this little criticism (I'm a "less is more" guy) from my way, this is completely astounding. The paintjobs are great - some of the expressions are simply perfect. And the idea, to show what would happen if 40k was more akin to real life, is a glorious and artistic one. I like it very much and I'm usually not into nudity on minis (not as long as there are sexy photos and porn as an alternative at least, lol). Great job!

I'm not sure how I feel about the exposed breast.

On one hand, it is a little graphic and overdone. It seems to make the piece more "sexy" and less "horrifying". With it, the piece ventures into the porn side of things.

On the other hand, it is a intentionally graphic and adds to the shock value of the piece. It guarantees the viewer understands what is going on and what the intention of the soldiers is. Without it, the piece looses some of it's edginess.

Grakmar wrote:

Mit Gas wrote:A daring piece that might've worked better with showing less of her boobs (like a smaller hole in her chest that shows just a tiny bit of skin instead of blantantly showing those rather huge melons for an eldar) but still, despite this little criticism (I'm a "less is more" guy) from my way, this is completely astounding. The paintjobs are great - some of the expressions are simply perfect. And the idea, to show what would happen if 40k was more akin to real life, is a glorious and artistic one. I like it very much and I'm usually not into nudity on minis (not as long as there are sexy photos and porn as an alternative at least, lol). Great job!

I'm not sure how I feel about the exposed breast.

On one hand, it is a little graphic and overdone. It seems to make the piece more "sexy" and less "horrifying". With it, the piece ventures into the porn side of things.

On the other hand, it is a intentionally graphic and adds to the shock value of the piece. It guarantees the viewer understands what is going on and what the intention of the soldiers is. Without it, the piece looses some of it's edginess.

I can totally see your point here. I guess it's down to personal preference but I'm not sure if it isn't even more awesome if you had to look at it twice before you understood "the big picture" cause that would make it even more twisted. Either way, it's a great littleproject that nicely showcases great skill and a very interesting take on 40k.

Now I've just shown the diorama to my wife, she finds it funny... and it wasn't "rape" that first comes to mind. I personally have no problem with the display from the OP, I think he has lots of talent, i've seen alot more modelling diorama which will make this one look like a fluffy bunny, and those are weird..... damn Japanese hobby conventions.

Also at the end of the day it's little toy soldiers which you play with or model, so why should be get offended and saying things about how it's morally wrong blah blah blah. Now if OP's piece is offensive and such how about this??? (I apologies to the mods if this is not really appropriate and feel free to remove.)

Warning Adult theme

MeanGreenStompa wrote:It can certainly be argued that such matter exists in the fiction written for the setting, but I feel that allusion remains a powerful mark of artistry and the thing could have been hinted at with far more subtly than 'oooh, space elf tits!'

I agree wholeheartedly, and I can think of something right off the top of my head that would have been a much better diorama, but much less "interesting" I guess since it wouldn't have tits in it just for the sake of tits.

You could have simply had the Eldar woman fully armored, maybe with her helmet broken or something to reveal her face if you were concerned about people "not knowing" she was female (as if the breastplate with breasts on it wouldn't have given it away) and the men just standing around her, giving each other the same looks. The tank driver is still watching, the knife is still laying next to her, the guy would have still had his lasgun and had it pointed at her "just in case"...get rid of the guy about to drop his pants, too, and I think this would have made for a much more meaningful diorama, because your mind doesn't immediately jump to rape, although it's still possible and in the back of your mind while looking at it. That would have been fething brilliant.

But no, we get this instead. Complete with a Guardsmen getting ready to whip his junk out in front of us.

See, it's not really the implication of rape that's distasteful, it's just the way you went about portraying this scene in my opinion. I think that's what bothers me the most about it, I just feel like I'm being hit over the head with a 2x4 that says "THIS IS A RAPE SCENE!". Make sense?

FerrumIgnatus wrote:There you have it.. even girls aren't offended by the diorama.

...um...dude? You showed one woman, that HARDLY gives you the right to make such a bold statement like "Even girls aren't offended by it, I have proof! Matter settled!"

Not to say it isn't nice to see what her opinion on it was, but one woman's opinion hardly means the matter is dead and done with. Would you agree if a woman went outside, found one donkey-cave guy, and forever used that as proof that all men are sexist pigs who objectify women?

Gibbsy wrote:Huh? So because im male i cant have an opinion?

That's one HELL of an assumption there, buddy*. Saying that women have the right to an opinion doesn't take away the right from men...

bluedestiny wrote:Now I've just shown the diorama to my wife, she finds it funny... and it wasn't "rape" that first comes to mind.

How can it NOT be the first thing that comes to mind? She did actually look at it, right?

She probably just found it "funny" because it's a serious scene someone modeled with what she views as toys. In her mind it's probably the same thing as using Legos or GI Joes to depict "the horror of war". So in my opinion that's not exactly an argument for the piece.


*Body? Jesus I can't type.

bluedestiny wrote:Now I've just shown the diorama to my wife, she finds it funny... and it wasn't "rape" that first comes to mind. I personally have no problem with the display from the OP, I think he has lots of talent, i've seen alot more modelling diorama which will make this one look like a fluffy bunny, and those are weird..... damn Japanese hobby conventions.

Also at the end of the day it's little toy soldiers which you play with or model, so why should be get offended and saying things about how it's morally wrong blah blah blah. Now if OP's piece is offensive and such how about this??? (I apologies to the mods if this is not really appropriate and feel free to remove.)

Warning Adult theme

Spoiler:

There was an equally long conversation about that model, I'll just link it for everyone's reference:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/328300.page

No real need to get back into that conversation, it played out as far as it had to go.

Sidstyler wrote:

MeanGreenStompa wrote:It can certainly be argued that such matter exists in the fiction written for the setting, but I feel that allusion remains a powerful mark of artistry and the thing could have been hinted at with far more subtly than 'oooh, space elf tits!'

I agree wholeheartedly, and I can think of something right off the top of my head that would have been a much better diorama, but much less "interesting" I guess since it wouldn't have tits in it just for the sake of tits.

You could have simply had the Eldar woman fully armored, maybe with her helmet broken or something to reveal her face if you were concerned about people "not knowing" she was female (as if the breastplate with breasts on it wouldn't have given it away) and the men just standing around her, giving each other the same looks. The tank driver is still watching, the knife is still laying next to her, the guy would have still had his lasgun and had it pointed at her "just in case"...get rid of the guy about to drop his pants, too, and I think this would have made for a much more meaningful diorama, because your mind doesn't immediately jump to rape, although it's still possible and in the back of your mind while looking at it. That would have been fething brilliant.

But no, we get this instead. Complete with a Guardsmen getting ready to whip his junk out in front of us.

See, it's not really the implication of rape that's distasteful, it's just the way you went about portraying this scene in my opinion. I think that's what bothers me the most about it, I just feel like I'm being hit over the head with a 2x4 that says "THIS IS A RAPE SCENE!". Make sense?

FerrumIgnatus wrote:There you have it.. even girls aren't offended by the diorama.

...um...dude? You showed one woman, that HARDLY gives you the right to make such a bold statement like "Even girls aren't offended by it, I have proof! Matter settled!"

Not to say it isn't nice to see what her opinion on it was, but one woman's opinion hardly means the matter is dead and done with. Would you agree if a woman went outside, found one donkey-cave guy, and forever used that as proof that all men are sexist pigs who objectify women?

Gibbsy wrote:Huh? So because im male i cant have an opinion?

That's one HELL of an assumption there, body. Saying that women have the right to an opinion doesn't take away the right from men...

So your point is this is wrong because it implies it to heavily?

You quoted my whole post for one sentence?

But to put it simply, yeah. I don't think this is necessarily "wrong", I just think it would have been better if it didn't feel like I was being beat over the head with the Obvious Stick. With a few "minor" differences, but otherwise* keeping the entire scene the same, I'd have been a lot more fond of it than I am.



*God wtf I oaigejaligm

I like it. It's definitely art, as this has generated a lot more discussion than the standard "oh, I see a mold line there" that CMON normally has.

My only critique on the technical side is that her torn breastplate looks wrong somehow. As in, I don't think it comes off that way. I'm not sure how Eldar armor disassembles, but I don't think it would look quite like that. I think the armor is one piece all the way up to the neck, so that part should be exposed as well. I also agree that she should probably have some sort of torn undershirt on.

As far as the depiction of rape, maybe it's because I discovered 40K in college, but I always assumed this was part of war in the Imperium. It's been a part of every war in history, why would it change in the future? I like this piece because it humanizes everything. This isn't just some 5 point Imperial Guardsmen versus an 8 point Guardian. It's not just a handful of men out of countless trillions. These are actual characters. For the first time, a 40K diorama made me think about these as real people. You might even like these guys if you met them in a bar after the battle. This reminds me of Band of Brothers, where even the "good" guys are doing horrible things. Apocalypse Now isn't a happy movie, and it doesn't make you feel good about US involvement in 'Nam, but it's art.

I see some justifications from people in this thread, and I think that is just an attempt to avoid the ultimate consequences of the piece. Despite the vaunted reflexes of the Eldar, I don't think that knife is going to do her any good. And based on her expression, I think she knows it too. And I don't think a Commissar is going to come along and execute them. I think they're going to get away with it. And that's what gives the piece its emotional impact. (Personally, I think such an act would generally get the Commissar's approval, as long as you shoot her afterwards).

Why aren't they raping a Tyranid? Because no one cares if you rape a Tyranid. For the same reason that a diorama of several horrified people crouching against a pile of rubble, staring at a Slaanesh marine with his back to the viewer and tentacles coming out of where his crotch would be wouldn't carry the same impact. Something like that would cheapen the message, turn it into a joke. This is close enough to reality to make us cringe, and that's why it's effective.

Art goes to places that make us uncomfortable. I saw When the Wind Blows when I was 8 or 9, and I think about it whenever people talk about Exterminatus being used. It's the story of a nice elderly couple who slowly die of radiation poisoning after a nuclear attack. It's grim and depressing and it's available on YouTube. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6EbsrJuAoQo I've also been to the Holocaust museum in DC, and I'm reminded of it when people talk about Imperial concentration camps. Our hobby references some incredibly dark and upsetting things, and people talk about it like it's no big deal. I'm not saying that we should all sit around and mope about how horrible everything is, it's perfectly fine to just sit back and enjoy your marine shooting a space monster. But it's also not an awful thing to look at it from a different perspective every once in a while, one that drives home the horror of war. And I think this diorama does that very well.

I don't like the constant assumptions made in this thread that people aren't ever thinking about it. Just because there isn't a diorama dedicated to genocide or torture every week, or several multi-page philosophical discussions about those things on forums, doesn't mean everyone just ignores it.

Our hobby references some incredibly dark and upsetting things, and people talk about it like it's no big deal. I'm not saying that we should all sit around and mope about how horrible everything is, it's perfectly fine to just sit back and enjoy your marine shooting a space monster.

Well, apparently that is what you're saying, because if you "sit back and enjoy" then you get accused of talking about it like it's "no big deal". We do need to mope about it all the time or else people will misinterpret our having fun as not giving a gak about the horror of war.

Sidstyler wrote:Well, apparently that is what you're saying, because if you "sit back and enjoy" then you get accused of talking about it like it's "no big deal". We do need to mope about it all the time or else people will misinterpret our having fun as not giving a gak about the horror of war.

Not really, no.

The point is that it is silly to get all mad about one aspect of war when you blithely ignore other things that are equally as bad, that's all. It's either all serious or none of it is.

Or, to paraphrase Frazzled, it's both.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Monster Rain wrote:it is silly to get all mad about one aspect of war when you blithely ignore other things that are equally as bad

Exactamundo. Rape is not a "privileged" form of violence; it's not out-of-bounds for discussion or even OTT portrayal. Witzkatz's theory of positively correlating realism to revulsion does not stop working for genocide or murder or torture unless you are somehow convinced that those things are less real than rape. Some people have said "well, this rape situation could happen close to where you live." So could torture and murder. And if you've bothered to watch the news over the last decades, you'll notice that genocide is not some relic of ages past, either.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

massey wrote:Why aren't they raping a Tyranid? Because no one cares if you rape a Tyranid.

I wonder what Ordo PETA would say about that. In all seriousness, you make some good points massey.

Sidstyler wrote:I don't like the constant assumptions made in this thread that people aren't ever thinking about it. Just because there isn't a diorama dedicated to genocide or torture every week, or several multi-page philosophical discussions about those things on forums, doesn't mean everyone just ignores it.

Our hobby references some incredibly dark and upsetting things, and people talk about it like it's no big deal. I'm not saying that we should all sit around and mope about how horrible everything is, it's perfectly fine to just sit back and enjoy your marine shooting a space monster.

Well, apparently that is what you're saying, because if you "sit back and enjoy" then you get accused of talking about it like it's "no big deal". We do need to mope about it all the time or else people will misinterpret our having fun as not giving a gak about the horror of war.

Do whatever the hell you want in your own hobby. If you prefer to think of 40K as a big violent Saturday morning cartoon, where Abaddon is basically the Skeletor/Hordak analog, then go ahead. Seriously, it's okay. That's the way I envision it half the time. If you prefer to think of Space Marines as more realistic future soldiers, where power weapons are really some sort of energized shank instead of a big huge sword, and they use lots of real tactics instead of just charging forward heroically, that's okay too. If you want your Imperial Guardsmen to just be faceless mooks that get cut down like they're fighting Arnold Schwarzenegger, that's fine.

It's your hobby. Do with it what you want. You don't have to take it seriously. I sure don't. I can't see an Ork gargant without thinking about the Technodrome from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. It's grimdark. It's satire. The villains come from heavy metal album covers and cartoons. So it can be whatever you want it to be. I also understand that there's a lot of really bad stuff in war that the game doesn't dwell on, despite its over the top dark nature.

You don't like the rape depiction? That's fine. You don't want it in your 40K? That's fine. If I had a 12 year old son, I certainly wouldn't want him playing a game where that was a part of it. That's not for 12 year olds. But I'm 32. I can appreciate what the OP was trying to do. You don't have to like art to appreciate it. In 1988, Alan Moore wrote a graphic novel called "The Killing Joke". In it, the Joker shoots Batgirl and paralyzes her. He then takes naked pictures of her. Some interpret it that he also rapes her, though it's not definitively stated. I don't like it. I don't like my superheroes being dirtied up that way. Supervillains shouldn't rape the hero's sidekick. That's not how I like my comic book characters. But I can't deny that it's art.

Hi All,

This is Mrs. MudgeBlack stepping in for a wee bit of opinion sharing. I will start off with...I do not play Warhammer, WarMachine or any of the "nerd games" (as I call them) oh stop your gasping...it's true...there are humans outside the world of Warhammer... ;-P Now...for this scene...Dear Hubby was very interested to show me this to get my viewpoint and to see what I thought of the scene/artwork/etc without any background or hint to the controversy at hand. Here's what I see...(keep in mind I know very little other than the crazed ramblings about this faction and that...)

I see an amazingly well executed paint and modeling job. I see a scene with some humanoid type soldiers...(Imperial Guard??) that have disabled an Eldar craft and captured one of it's occupants. I see a really pissed off Eldar with a knife within reach...and I see 5 Imperial Guard guys about to get their asses handed to them in a very big way.

Why do I see it that way? Well...what I have been told of the Eldar is that they have speed and ferocity greater to that of the Imperial Guard. She's clearly pissed off...her expression (which I have to say is superbly painted) is not fear, it is anger and plotting. She is calculating which of the Guard Guys to mangle and disable first. Clearly the Guard with the gun must go first...a bit of mud to the face will surely shock and delay any fire power he might hold. The Guard holding the armor breastplate is clearly too fascinated that he has just exposed Eldar boobs to be of any immediate threat. The guard behind her that thinks he is about to have a moment at her expense will be the first to feel the wrath of the Eldar scorned. The knife should take him out tut suite. The voyeur in the tank looking thing...he's a coward and he will run for his miserable little life...the other guard with the gun will more than likely respect the "laws of war" and honour that she has disabled 3 of his men and earned her freedom. The "booby trapped" guard will come to his senses try to make a run and be dispatched in some manner by her and her breastplate returned. She and the honorable gunman will exchange a nod and she will be on her merry way. That's what I see.

Not for one moment in viewing the scene did it come to mind that this is depicting a rape scene. Would I show this to my kids? damn skippy I would...there's nothing here that I think would harm their little minds. I am not a soldier myself, nor is dear Mudge...however, I have had soldiers within my family and they do not romanticize war in the least. Sure there are plenty of honorable soldiers in the world, I do not wish to take that from any of them at all. However, there are scumbags within the world of war that may choose to take advantage of a situation such as this.

btw...The painting and modeling is amazing!

oh stop your gasping...it's true...there are humans outside the world of Warhammer... ;-P

...and I'm officially done with this thread. I can't say any more without breaking Rule #1, so feth it.

I have to agree with you, Sid.

Lotta flame bait right there.

Frazzled wrote:

Manchu wrote:

Frazzled wrote:And you do? What art school for miniatures did you graduate from again?

The same one you did; in other words, actually caring about and participating in the hobby.

See that wouldn't work on my end as She Who Must Be Obeyed comes from an arty family that actually went to art school/does art for a living (not her). My toy soldiers aren't viewed as real art by them. The laughter I'd get if I showed that to them would not be good.

Cheer up man. They went to art school. So maybe they can laugh at your toy soldiers but you can laugh at their 'education' in response. Remember, Artists don't go to school for it, only artists do that.

I do think this could be 'art' in the same way that some comic books kind of stand out as such. It isn't high art like some kind of rennaissance masterpiece, but it definitely challenges the viewer a lot more on a moral and aesthetic level than having a well painted blended fade-down wash on a multi-hues rainbow sword blade on a figure with a pile of 100 individualy painted and shaded skulls at its feet etc etc. The diorama is creepy, the dorky demon guy alternative is just juvenile stereotypical fantasy imagery painted well. Painting well is not necessarily artistic, it is skillful. Possibly the most disturbing scene I have seen in any 40k pictures or modelling, because it is ugly realistic. I can watch giant bugs hacking people in half and demons chewing on intestines and heads exploding all day and not be the slightest bit disgusted because it is silly juvenile fantasy. This scene is actually really fethed up, which is what makes it good in my opinion.

Its about time the 'GRIM' part got actually GRIM, because for the most part, we get plenty of darkness and plenty of war, but the 'grim' is not nearly so blatant.

What a lovely thread. Pity that it really, really needs to be locked.