reviewed by C. J. Czelling
(9/20/00)

This isn’t exactly a coffee table book. First of all, it is too small (1.09" x 9.11"x 6.87", probably even numbers in centimeters.) This is a book that would scare the hell out of the matrons of the coffee klatch. But it is a beautifully made book that would go on my coffee table, if I had one. It starts with the binding. This otherwise conventionally shaped book is printed sideways, so that you open it away from you rather than to the left. The stitched, soft cloth binding allows the book to lie flat so that the images are not distorted. But yet, in a way, they are. The only thing more distorted than the images on these pages are the words that go with them.

This is Digital Diaries by Natacha Merritt. A woven bookmark is bound into the book. This is a good thing to have, because you should read this book very slowly. You should pick it up, look at a few photographs, read some words, and put it down. Come back to it a few days later. To write this review, I went through it in three days. This was way too intense. Fortunately, a relaxed deadline gave me time to go back to the book after a couple of weeks and enjoy it properly. This is the most remarkable work of erotic photography ever published. If you could mix Cindy Sherman, Robert Mapplethorpe, Nan Goldin, and the rumored suppressed works of Diane Arbus, you might come close, but you would miss the unity of erotic imagination and obsession of these photographs and writings.

Merritt's written diaries from adolescence, interviews by her mentor, and brief interspersions of her own current commentary are included. The photos don't cover every possible sex act, but they hit all the high spots. She has a special fondness for photographing herself, sometimes holding the camera at arm's length, while sucking on a cock. Some will call this pornography, but they say that about Mapplethorpe, and some of them even say it about Sherman. If Mapplethorpe had been a (mostly) straight woman instead of a (mostly) gay man, or if Sherman did not cover her own body parts with plastic imitation body parts, they might have made this book (hopefully together.)

Like Sherman, Merritt's favorite model is herself. Her favorite subject is sex, preferably her own acts. She says that she no longer has sex except before the camera. It must be disconcerting when she asks you to sign a model release before making love to her. She works exclusively with digital cameras. She claims to know nothing about conventional photography, and acquiesces to the interviewer's statement that she doesn't "know the difference between an f-stop and a bus stop." What she does understand is the unique potential of the digital camera; for instance, you don't have to look through a digital camera to aim it. You can hold it to one side, point it back at yourself, stick it between your legs, and still turn the LCD screen around to see what you're doing.

The images are crystal-clear, as if to demonstrate that she can produce what Ansel Adams called a "perfect print," and has chosen not to. It is rather like looking at the early draftsmanship of Jackson Pollock before he took up paint-slinging, or the undistorted vision of Salvador Dali before his brain melted. When not photographing herself, she finds other beautiful women, and an occasional erect man. The scenes range from just lying around nude, or in underwear, to explicit shots of masturbation, fellatio, intercourse, and one shot of a man urinating on a woman's breasts. I think it's Natacha; it's hard to tell with just her nipples for identification.

She really understands the erotic potential of underwear. Some of the photos in tights are more erotic than her blow-jobs. There are a few semi-lesbian photos, mostly showing lips poised just above genitals or nipples. "All my thoughts and feelings: I used to write them down. As soon as I had a camera, I stopped writing, and recorded my thoughts and feelings with photographs. My life has become a bunch of digital photos as opposed to a bunch of written thoughts."

I can't review this book without describing some of the photographs. One interesting thing is that the photos are titled with their graphic file names, some just as they came from the camera software(such as redlips005._t/P.059, etc.). Some of the highlights: a close up of swelling, out-of-focus labia, filling the image, with two fingers massaging the inner lips; a woman, from the waist down, her black skirt pulled up with a penis just penetrating her; a soapy woman in the shower, straddling the camera; a woman in bra and panties, net thigh-highs, black boots, and pigtails (with barrettes), seated on the floor; many reminiscent of the solarized works of Man Ray. And of course we can't miss the blow-jobs in the dark; the woman cross-lighted, sucking on a cock wrapped in thin rope; a mouth, a shoulder and a cock wrapped in studded leather, or the kiss on the tip of a wet penis. Finally, there is a single cityscape, showing one of the most phallic looking skyscrapers you will ever see.

Overall, this book is a remarkable experience. Trying to be objective, I have looked for things to criticize in the negative sense. It doesn't conform to my personal obsession with photographic precision, but it makes me not care whether it does. Unless you are not comfortable with real, raw sexuality, you should buy this book.