EROS/EROTICON — Is It Art? Is It Porn? Vol. II – A as in Art, Adorning Eros, Arousing Arts
For me they [orchids] are like women and boys— I kissed and tasted each until the end All died on my red lips. — Anita Berber, Orchids, from Die Tänze des Lasters, des Grauens und der Ekstase, Vienna, 1922
Hz Dotz "El Tango de Roxanne"
Editor’s Note: Beauty may lie in the eye of the beholder — but what about eroticism? Eroticon is my love letter to Eros: as ancient as temple incense, as fresh as your last browser tab.
We started this pilgrimage through images, sensations, contradictions — from sacred rites to grindhouse cinema, from Plato’s philosophical eros to unapologetic porn close-ups — chasing the elusive, shape-shifting god.
In Vol.I we vogued through poetics of the Pornosphere. Now, with a sly smile and a sharpened quill, we arrive at A for Arousing Arts. From the smoky salons of Weimar Berlin to the glass cases of the British Museum, erotic art refuses to be neatly shelved - Eros won’t be filed into oblivion.
It slithers between categories. It can be poetic or pornographic, marble-pure or gutter-raw, linger in a Proustian memory or a Russ Meyer zoom-in. The question remains: Is it art, is it porn — or is the distinction the ultimate cultural mirage?
Fig.1 Still from the film Immoral Tales (1974), a collection of four erotic tales after Ovid's Ars Amatoria, directed by Walerian Borowczyk.
Fig.2 Music video for A$AP Rocky's song D.M.B. (Dat $tick), feat Rihanna, 2022, film still
Fig.3 Olga Desmond performing the ‘Sword Dance’ (1908). Photo by Otto Skowranek (via stagingdecadence)
Fig.4 'Nagel Woman' graphic art 1980s Patrick Nagel's distinctive style - minimalist, high-contrast portraits with elegant bold lines
Fig.5 Nan Goldin, Greer modeling jewelry, NYC, 1985. Photography from the series The Other Side. Courtesy of the artist and Gagosian. (Credits Musée Magazine)
Act I: P as in Prelude
Our first letter was P — not A. Because why be orderly when you can be obscene? P is for pornstar, pulp poetry, Pompeii, and Priapus (the eternally erect Greek god of virility). P for pussy — poetry, portal, punchline, planet. P for pee play and pulp fiction. Performance art and protest. Pride — born from Stonewall fire, still voguing, still raging.
P is also for the Pornosphere — a sweaty ecosystem of cabaret dancers, hairy cult pornstars, sticky queer zines passed from hand to hand like contraband holy texts. Here, porn isn’t a product. It’s a practice. Feminist film collectives, OnlyFans gang-bang entrepreneurs, queer erotic archives glittering with sequins and lube — all part of the archive of lust.
Fig.6 Paul Dandin, Erotic scene, 1938. (Credits Aukro)
Fig.7 Paul Laurenzi artwork plunges us into an erotic and marvelous world where sensuality reigns. (Via Disposableteenz)
Fig.8 Olivia DeBerardinis Her Piercing Look, 1992 Gouache and watercolor on board
Act II: A is for Arousing Arts
Welcome to the Eroticon Zone — territory of Uninhibited Eros and Forbidden Desires. Here the muses don’t whisper; they bite, kiss, scratch, and drape themselves in pearls.
Arousing art makes your pulse quicken. A marble thigh, a brushstroke like a sigh, a photograph that stares back at you. Sometimes protest excites more than pornography. Sometimes rebellion is the kink.
Rule No. 1: There’s No Art Without Eros. NO ART WITHOUT EROS
Arousing Art is not a genre — it’s a current running beneath all culture. Sometimes it’s a whisper (the shadow of a thigh in a Modigliani nude), sometimes a shout (Mapplethorpe’s X Portfolio). And sometimes, rebellion itself becomes erotic — the raised fist as aphrodisiac.
Pompeii knew this: BV - Before Vesuvius-, the city lived in a haze of Venus’ benevolence — sex was public, joy was normal, and the concept of “obscenity” simply didn’t exist.
Wall art showed gods and mortals coupling with mythic nonchalance. Phalluses hung as good luck charms. Graffiti spelled out poetry, boasts, and erotic invitations. Love and lust were earthly practices, celebrated, painted, laughed at, prayed to.
Pompeii and Herculaneum, forever paused mid-breath by flowing lava rivers, tell us that love, lust, and laughter were daily bread. Frescoes show Venus in her shell, Satyrs stroking Nymphs sweet breasts — and pygmies having improbable Nile-side orgies.
Erotic graffiti once scrawled on tavern walls now sits behind museum glass, stripped of its original immediacy, yet still humming with life.
Fig.9 Polyphemus and Galatea kissing. Fresco from a Pompeii sleeping room. Naples National Archaeological Museum. around 50 CE – 79 CE
Fig.10 Ralph Brown (1928-2013), The Bride (also known as Relief Bride or La Sposa), ca 1975 - bronze sculpture
Don't miss out the extended version of the article in Premium and discover what's behind Act III: THE ART / PORN PARADOX, Act IV: A as in ADORNED DESIRE, Act V: A for Arts, V for Vintage, and Vulva of Venus, and Postlude: A is for ARS AMANDI. AROUSING ARTS AS ANTIDOTE.
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