Filmmaker, illustrator, and fashion photographer Quentin Jones is known for her collage-like compositions, often relying on a cut-and-paste aesthetic. For a new video featuring Miley Cyrus, she chops up images of the twerking queen for a bondage-themed joy ride.
In Tongue Tied Miley appears in black leather with plenty of tongue and She wears masks, covers herself with black paint, appears fragmented into multiple Mileys — reminiscent to Quentin´s daring self-portrait Naked with Paint.
In the USA, any fresh ‘n’ hot star with blonde ambitions is bound to be a sex symbol. Miley Cyrus wears that bondage lightly. And literally. She stretches the definition of kink, making it pop. On stage, riding a giant hot dog, she grins like the girl who yells loudest in the “penis!” game. She could stop, actually, if she wanted to… but she won’t. She wears her latex like she’s dressing up as herself for Halloween: “I’m a Sexy Miley Cyrus! What are you?”
As part of Cyrus’ current Bangerz tour is a two-minute video directed by mixed-media artist and filmmaker Quentin Jones, whose signature soignée graphics and splashes of paint transform a pornoriffic-almost-parody into artsploitation. Stripping the color from our heroine’s cartoonish persona, Jones goes in on popular symbols of sex: the fishnets; the beauty mark made darker like Marilyn’s; the black collar fit for a ‘Bunny. To Miley, as to a little kid, even the most dangerous object is a toy. And like a kid’s, her near-nudity is hardly erotic. She’s just happier naked. Her poses are jokes, even that infamous tongue—stuck out—remains firmly in cheek. She holds up the cardboard cut-out and winks. Get it? She’s playing with herself.
It should be clear as ink that Miley Cyrus is no former Disney kid. She’s a forever Disney kid. Sixty years after Walt himself collaborated with Salvador Dali, his phantasmagorical dreams of goofy innocence and erotically charged surrealism have been reanimated.
Sarah Nicole Prickett ( founding editor of Adult magazine) on Nowness.com
