1. How Far Can You Go?
2. Naughty in N'awlins
3. The strange and embarrassing of 2003 in Washington
1. How Far Can You Go?
2. Naughty in N'awlins
3. The strange and embarrassing of 2003 in Washington
How Far Can You Go?
by Linda Yablonsky
Artnews magazine
January issue
With the Internet and cable TV making pornography widely available on an anytime-of-day basis, it was probably inevitable that artists would find their own ways to channel it into their work and that galleries would show the results. Consider the New York exhibition season just past, most notable not for nudity, which now sells tickets only on Broadway, but for the number of phalluses in plain view.
At Lehmann Maupin, for example, German fashion photographer Juergen Teller showed a number of large-format family pictures in which he appeared completely and unattractively starkers. Giving an appreciative nod to Surrealist sex games, independent curator Bob Nickas designed a ribald group exhibition for Team Gallery as a "frisky" riposte to the politics of George W. Bush. (It included, along with romantic images by such transgressive heroes as Jack Smith and Larry Clark, Michael Meads's photographic triptych of a man taking his pleasure with a pumpkin.) And the most commanding image in Adam Fuss's show at Cheim & Read was his photogram of a full-length male nude, seen in profile, with his manhood in full salute.
It's not that we haven't seen kinky images in contemporary art before. We have, and plenty of them, from those of Robert Mapplethorpe clowning with a bullwhip in his anus to John O'Reilly's sex-with-Jesus photocollages to Sally Mann's sensual portraits of her children, Amy Adler's nothing-to-hide "centerfold" self-portraits, and Kara Walker's sexually driven master-slave silhouettes. But there does seem to have been a shift in emphasis in recent years, particularly in regard to hard-core male sexuality.
[cont.]
To read this article, go to:
http://www.artnewsonline.com/currentarticle.cfm?type=feature&art_id=1454
To respond, go to:
http://www.artnewsonline.com/letters.cfm
Naughty in N'awlins
by Tristan Taormino The Village Voice December 26, 2003
NEW ORLEANS – I've been to swingers' parties before but never to a full-scale swing convention. When I was invited to teach sex workshops at the fifth annual "N'awlins in November" (neworleansinnovember.com), I checked out the website: It promised four days of classes, themed dance parties, and the world's first and only Swinger's Pride Parade down Bourbon Street. Over 1,600 swingers were set to take over an entire hotel and invade Louisiana: How could I miss that?
While I can't pass up an opportunity to immerse myself in another sexual subculture, I had a few reservations. What troubles me about swingers is that while I consider them a sexual minority, a community whose members behave in ways outside the norm, the majority don't see themselves that way. In general, swingers are quite invested in being straight, and I don't mean just hetero. They are married, taxpaying homeowners with kids and careers and 401(k)'s. They are normal folks who happen to enjoy having sex with people other than their spouses, which, according to them, makes them fun loving, not radical. While some who swing consider themselves polyamorous, most are very committed to monogamy: They're emotionally monogamous and sexually non-monogamous. There is also an insidious double standard when it comes to homo activity: The girls can do other girls, but the guys cannot do other guys. If there are bi men, and there have to be, they are closeted. I want swingers to be more politically conscious and active than they are. I want them to see their commonalities with queer people, cross-dressers, and leatherfolk, all of whom can and do face discrimination when "outed" to conservative neighbors, employers, and communities.
[cont.]
To read this article, go to:
http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0353/taormino.php
To respond, go to:
http://www.villagevoice.com/aboutus/letters.php
The strange and embarrassing of 2003 in Washington
by Nicholas K. Geranios
Associated Press
via The Herald (Everett, Washington)
December 29, 2003
SPOKANE, Wash. — With war, unemployment and economic woes darkening the moods of many Washingtonians this holiday season, it's time to recall some of the unusual stories of 2003.
Seattle WNBA star Sue Bird made a bet with a radio announcer that she would have a good assist-to-turnover ratio this season, or be spanked during his radio show. Had she lost, Bird would have had to cry, "Harder, Daddy, harder" during the spanking. After a public outcry, Bird backed out of the bet.
[cont.]
To read this article, go to:
http://www.heraldnet.com/Stories/03/12/29/17955390.cfm
To respond, write to: letters@heraldnet.com
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