LENDING A HAND: 1920s Erotica

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If you enjoyed reading about the images in nineteenth and early twentieth texts in L’Enfer de la Bibliothèque nationale de France, you may enjoy Phil’s discussion of images in earlier works from the seventeenth to nineteenth century. You may also be interested in reading about another module in Gale’s Archives of Sexuality and Gender series, Sex and Sexuality, Sixteenth to Twentieth Century, in Sex! … and Sexuality, and Gender which discusses the Private Case from the British Library, materials from the Alfred C. Kinsey Institute for Sex Research and the New York Academy of Medicine. Argentine-Italian surrealist painter Leonor Fini was invited to illustrate La Galère and created six etchings depicting explicit sexual activities between men. Finding homosexual erotica can be challenging given past social attitudes toward homosexuality. In 1956, Genet was given a fine and a suspended prison sentence for publishing the illustrated editions of La Galère and Querelle de Brest, both of which were considered “in contempt of morality”. Finding a work that artistically depicts gay intimacy, especially illustrated by a female artist, is something of a rarity.

Vintage porn has an undeniable appeal. Every photograph tells a story, and you can tell that some thought went into setting up each shot. Why does that woman have a Howdy Doody doll in her hand? How did that man get his leg up over the steering wheel? Did those newlyweds take these photos themselves, or were they on a set?

The Smiling Victorians

The Uncharted Sea, meanwhile, warns young men of the dire consequences that will arise from licentious living, and the price is not left in doubt. “I’ve paid heavily for one night out,” bewails our hero, George. “I’ve lost my job, and now I have gonorrhea.” In the interest of exploring art and social history in twentieth-century erotica, let us descend into the fabulous, scandalous, and enticing digital collection of L’Enfer de la Bibliothèque nationale de France. Erotic Courtesan Fantasy

Domínguez was a Spanish artist best known for his loosely rendered Surrealist paintings. Influenced by avant-garde European painters such as René Magritte, Giorgio de Chirico, and Yves Tanguy, he employed bizarre subject matter to great effect. Domínguez, like Max Ernst, used a technique called decalcomania, a technique used by some surrealist artists which involves pressing paint between sheets of paper. Hugnet, Georges. Le feu au cul / [Georges Hugnet]; [illustrations d’Oscar Domínguez]. Illustrated by Oscar Dominguez, [Robert J. Godet], [1943]. Archives of Sexuality and Gender, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/GKUCFJ839309656/AHSI?u=omni&sid=AHSI&xid=be484433&pg=5 Hugnet, Georges. Le feu au cul / [Georges Hugnet]; [illustrations d’Oscar Domínguez]. Illustrated by Oscar Dominguez, [Robert J. Godet], [1943]. Archives of Sexuality and Gender, https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/GKUCFJ839309656/AHSI?u=omni&sid=AHSI&xid=be484433&pg=20 Illustration for plays Please be aware that this blog post contains content that may be offensive to some readers; the decision to read the post is at your own discretion. As you can see, the panel depicts a mother and child being protected from a fanged serpent by a nude, bearded, knife-wielding father. However, the trustees of the School did not appreciate the display of male genitalia and would not allow it to be placed above the School's entrance unless Kennington added a loincloth. At the core of everything we do is our reproductive drive. It's primitive. It makes men want to be powerful to get women and women want to be beautiful so they can get men. That's why we want to take lots of pictures." Surrealism was a cultural movement which developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I and was largely influenced by Dadaism. According to André Breton, surrealism utilised art and literature to “resolve the previously contradictory conditions of dream and reality into an absolute reality, a super-reality”, or “surreality”. Surrealist artists and writers frequently employed free association, dream analysis, and the unconscious mind to create their works. Surrealism was a philosophical movement, but also a revolutionary movement most commonly associated with communism and anarchism. From the 1920’s onward, Paris was a centre of the surrealist movement, so it is no surprise to see a number of works in Enfer written and illustrated in surrealist style.

A Unique Tea Setting For Two

Leonor Fini was an Argentine-Italian painter who spent much of her artistic career in France. Associated with the Surrealist movement, Fini’s self-portraits and mythological paintings focused on eroticism and dreams. “ Paintings, like dreams, have a life of their own and I have always painted very much the way I dream,” she once said. Genet, Jean. La galère/de Jean Genet.; [Eaux-fortes de Leonor Fini.]. Illustrated by Leonor Fini, Jacques Loyau, 1947. Archives of Sexuality and Gender, It was between the acts put on in Soho’s strip clubs that the short uncertified films Goodnight with Sabrina (1958) and Burlesque Queen (1961) would have been exhibited. With tassels twirling, over-elaborate dance steps and bodies swathed in voluminous gauze, these 8mm shorts are caught in time, oddly prim in routines that could have been choreographed by the Women’s Institute. However, having a woman artist creating a male nude has been something of a rarity, especially depicting any hint of genitalia. Student works by women on Art UK through the twentieth century show that even when they painted from life, the male models were often modestly covered.