Talk:Man Mocked by Two Women

interpretation of individuals[edit]

I don't have access to the Licht piece or the Junquera piece that are cited in this article, but I'm fairly sure the author of the article interpreted them wrong in terms of which figures in the painting are generally considered by critics to be the mocking women, and which is considered to be the masturbating man. The Spanish language version of the article says the women are generally thought to be the center and left figure. Indeed, even in this article, it says of the male figure, "His hands are around his crotch" (hence the frequent interpretation that the male figure in the image is masturbating). However, if the male figure and the masturbation interpretation are based on there being hands around the figure's crotch, the male figure MUST be the one at right - as mentioned in the Spanish wikipedia article.

If, as this article says, a critic is interpreting the man to be the figure on the left, then there is no reason to mention the man's hands. The man must be the figure on the right. The most likely explanation to me seems to be that the writer of the article misinterpreted the genders of the painting themselves, and then based on that misinterpretation got confused about what art critics were saying about it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.181.16.100 (talk) 15:03, 6 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I found the Licht book cited (a later edition, which changes the page numbers, but all the quotes are still the same) and indeed, this article differs in its estimation of which figures are which gender. Will update. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.181.16.100 (talk) 19:04, 6 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]

(For the record, Licht says "In 'Two Young People Laughing at a Man,' we no longer have any clues - not even the teasingly deceptive hints of narrative that can be found in 'Atropos' and 'Saturn.' ... The man, facing us, with his hands somewhere in the darkness of his crotch, is possibly masturbating or exposing himself." This very clearly identifies the man as the figure at right and not the figure in profile as this article originally stated.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.181.16.100 (talk) 13:36, 7 April 2015 (UTC)[reply]