Challenging viewing

[markc]

DanielK's recent post for critique brought up the issue of challenging viewing for me. A while back it probably would have set off my "gross" meter, but now it barely nudged it. That in itself is probably worth a whole discussion, but it reminded me of when I first viewed Joel-Peter Witkin's work. Yes, those are real corpses. I wrote a little about this before in talking about my own work, and how I wanted to have some element that was a little unsettling but not to the degree that people would be outright challenged by looking at it. It can be very difficult to give work an objective view as to technique when the subject matter hits you the wrong way.

So, does anyone have examples of work that they themselves have found challenging? Do you temper your own work for the sake of the viewer? Have you done anything yourself that others have considered challenging?