010. The Fine Line: Erotic Art & Pornography

The Fine Line: Erotic Art & Pornography

Erotic Art and Pornography are often talked about as if they are the same thing; people misinterpret Erotic pieces of art and believe them to be pornography. Erotic Art is defined as any artistic work that is intended to evoke erotic arousal or that depicts scenes of lovemaking. It includes paintings, engravings, drawings, sculptures, photographs, music and writing. While Pornography is the depiction of sexual behavior that is intended to arouse sexual excitement in its audience. As you can see the fine line between Erotic Art and Pornography can easily be mistaken or confused because the definitions are so similar. The most important difference between Erotic Art and Pornography is the way in which the images are presented as well as the way in which the image is intended to be viewed and often the medium that is used to make the image. Basically, people’s mentality determines the way in which the images are viewed they can either be beautiful pieces of art or vulgar images intended to help someone “bust a nut,” as many would say.

The History of Erotic Art is an extensive one, it goes as far back as the paintings found in the Lascaux Cave, which were discovered in 1948 but are said to have been painted over 17,000 years ago. In a section of the cave there is a small painting of a man hunting a buffalo with an erect penis. Many scholars who have studied the paintings have decided that the hunter was depicted as erect because of the excitement of hunting. Although this isn’t said to be a work of erotic art, it, shows the excitement in everyday tasks. The first recorded finding of erotic art was in the city of Pompeii that was constructed in the eighteenth century B.C. by the Romans. One of the most famous buildings in Pompeii was the Lupanare known as a Brothel. The inside of the Brothels offered a variety of paintings and frescos that depicted erotic, sexual and sometimes explicit scenes. One example of an erotic image from Pompeii is in the house of Vetti, the fresco is called Fauces and Priapus showing the roman god Priapus measuring his falis, the god is fully clothed in typical roman robes and looks unashamed of his action, in fact it looks like a common action for the god. According the article, The Image of Roman Priapus:

“Artistic representations also serve to construct this image for the rustic, earth-bound god, who, in sharp contrast with more noble deities, is rarely liberated from the poor fabric of his ‘statue’. This image has generally been taken at face value: it is assumed that the Roman countryside was full of simple peasant figures of the god, which are now, inevitably, lost. While this might be true, the portrayal of Priapus in art and literature is poor evidence for such a ‘reality’. These are sophisticated images for a self-consciously sophisticated audience. It may be that this portrayal of Priapus served a specific function, establishing him as a foil to the civilization of a Hellenized, early–imperial Rome.”(Clare College)

Although people may see this image as very forward, the image is a relatable god for the Peasants in the Roman countryside.

Some of the most famous erotic images are from the Hindu culture:

“Kama Sutra is an ancient Indian Sanskrit treatise that enumerates as well as describes in detail the basic rules governing sensuous physical relationship, love and marriage between a couple as per the Hindu law.” (lifestyle lounge)

The first English translated copy was printed in the year 1883 it was a private publication. Although the Kama Sutra was not the first English translated book dedicated to showing the importance lovemaking had in the Hindu culture, it was certainly the most influential publication illustrating the significance making love had in their culture. The Kama Sutra shows couples enjoying intercourse in several different positions. Although the images are graphic in nature, they are symbolic and show the great care and time put in pleasing one another by the care and time put in making these images. The sexual act is depicted very detailed, the setting in which the characters are making love is just as detailed.

Although the Kama Sutra is the most well known sexual manuscript, it certainly is not the oldest. Sexual manuscripts have been traced to China as far as two thousand years before Christ. These manuscripts were not written on paper but on porcelain dishes and were often buried in places where future rebel leaders would possibly be born; the dishes were thought to bring luck to the future rulers. The images produced told stories of the healthy properties intercourse had to offer.

“In the Eastern Han Dynasty (A.D. 25-220), a group of Taoist philosophers created Yin Taoism, firmly rooted in the importance of human sexual expression. This school of Taoists wrote volume after volume of sex manuals including "Su Nu Ching" (Manual of Lady Purity), "Yu Fang Mi Chueh" (Secret Codes of the Jade Room) the "Art of the Bedchamber" and "Yu Fang Chih Yao" (Important Guidelines of the Jade Room). To give their works authority and to exert influence on the emperors the Yin Taoists attributed the key points in their manuals to Huang Ti (the Yellow Emperor) and the ancient authority Peng Tsu who was said to have lived to 800 years of age.” (All-art.org)

The Yin Taostits’ believed that it was important to expresses oneself sexually, their manuscripts express the story of how being sexually active is the key to a long life.

Throughout Art History, Erotic Art has been used to tells stories of sexual arousal, sexual prosperity as well as sexual healing. Erotic art throughout history has been used as a tool to inform people of the beauty that erotica can offer. More modern Erotic Art is often much more crude than past Erotic Artworks. The invention of offset printing made the distribution of Erotic images much easier. The period between the years 1890 and 1920 was known as the, Golden Years because of the high speeds in which prints could be made and distributed.

During the Golden Years is when photography was invented, as well as offset printing and several other ways in which images could be mass-produced and distributed. With the invention of photography came the invention of Pornography, which was defined earlier in this paper as the depiction of sexual behavior that is intended to arouse sexual excitement in its audience. Although this is very similar to the definition to Erotic Art, it is not the same. Erotic Art celebrates the importance of sexual intercourse throughout various cultures history. Pornography uses many different mediums to create lude images of people in the act of having sex; unlike Erotic images that usually show people ‘making love’ the people in pornography are participating in the act of having sex. The main differences between the two types of images rely on the basic difference between the meanings of, making love and having sex. In order to understand the difference between Erotic Art and Pornography one must understand the difference between making love and having sex. To make love the people involved in the act of sex must share deep rooted feelings for one another, often the people are married, while to have sex is a casual affair a person might participate in as a recreational purpose, the people involved usually do not have deep rooted feelings for one another.

As stated before the invention of pornography followed closely behind the invention of photography,

“The earliest pornographic daguerreotype is an 1846 exposure housed at the Kinsey Institute; it depicts a middle-aged man inserting his phallus into a middle-aged woman’s vagina.” (Davis, Noble and White)

The easier and cheaper mass production became the more available these pornographic imaged became,

“The ability to produce multiple copies of a photograph led to the industrialization of pornographic photographs. The result was profound; in 1848, there were thirteen photographic studios in Paris, by 1860, there were over four hundred. The Parisian output of nude photographs was prolific, in 1852, forty percent of the photographs registered for sale in Paris, were nudes” (Davis, Noble and White)

The pornography industry was thriving; the images were being sold in trains stations, bars, barbershops, and movie theaters. Since pornography is was sold mostly to men, it could be found anywhere there would be large groups of men. Although pornography was making its way into mainstream media it still needed a proper vessel in which is should be delivered until,

“Pornography’s vehicle to the masses, the men’s magazine had been born. One of the early magazines was an English title by the name of Photo Bits; it portrayed burlesque actresses in natural settings with explicit articles accompanying the photographs” (Davis, Noble and White)

The explicit articles usually offered men stories about the women in the pornographic images, these stories allowed me to create fantasies about these women. The United States didn’t publish nude women in magazines until the 1920’s when they published Tijuana Bibles, which were a cheap alternative to pornography that had stapled pages of revealing photos of women, erotic comics and short stories. The Tijuana Bibles were printed on cheap paper and were especially popular during the depression.

Years after The Depression in 1953, Hugh Hefner published the first issue of Playboy Magazine. Marylin Monroe posed as the first nude centerfold in Playboy. Although Playboy was controversial Hefner managed to keep pubic hair and gentile out of the photos in the early years, he also used what was considered respectable photography to keep the images from being censored. Not long after Hefner published Playboy, Bob Guccione published a more risqué photos of women in which their pubic hair was visible, the first American publish Penthouse was in 1969. In 1974 Larry Flynt Jr. created Hustler magazine which went where no mass- marketed men’s magazine had gone before, he showed photos where the women showed their genitals, leaving nothing left to the imagination.

“Playboy, Penthouse and Hustler have been the most popular magazines in the history of pornography. Traditionally each brand has dominated a specific niche within the men’s magazine market; Playboy is known for its soft-core content, Hustler is known for its hardcore material, and Penthouse occupies the space in-between. Men’s magazines were the primary vehicles for pornographic distribution from the early twentieth century to the 1970s. Their popularity declined alongside the advent of new technologies.” (Davis, Noble and White)

Men’s magazines are still a primary source of pornography in modern times, although they have also come out with movies, TV shows and books to advance with technologies.

In 1896, Marie, the first pornographic film was created, the film showed a man and woman having intercourse as well as a women giving a striptease, a performance, as in a burlesque act, in which a person slowly removes clothing, usually to musical accompaniment. (Dictionary.com) These films were known as stag films. These films were illegal until the 1970s when the first full-length stag film was created; this film was also the first legally X-rated film. Earlier stag films where less than fifteen mintures long and shot illegally and were silent films. In 1972, the first full length color pornography was made, the film was called Deep Throat, this film was the first approachable stag film for the American public, instead of showing sex explicitly the film offered a plot in which the audience could follow, and a sound track. In March 1973, the censors shut down Deep Throat, only after over two hundred and fifty thousand people had seen it. In 1972, after Deep Throat was released another film named Behind the Green Door was released this film help create one of the most famous porn stars of the 1970s, Marilyn Chambers.

Later the creation of the VHS tape was yet another important milestone in pornography, it allowed people to watch pornography in the comfort of their own home. The Anonymity of being able to watch pornography in their own enticed more people to purchase the films. VHS was the most popular to view pornography until the DVD came out.

The Pornography industry uses technology to its advantage; “Pornography is now the most popular Internet destination for American men aged eighteen to thirty four. It is 50 percent more popular than music sites or eBay and four times more popular than travel services such as hotel and airline reservations” (Davis, Noble and White) People are more open to the idea of pornography in the twenty first century than they were in the 1950s, there are now porn stars like Jenna Jameson who are commonly known celebrities, in fact Jenna Jameson is not only a porn star but an Author, director and more recently a mother. Pornography is becoming more and more acceptable, and most men and women will admit to at one point viewing a pornography.

Erotic Art and Pornography is only as sexual as you make it, although Erotic Art are sexual images made in a less risqué manner than Pornography; which usually depicts people in the act of having sex in a crude manner. Often people argue that Erotic Art and Pornography is the same thing, and often Erotic Art is an alibi for pornography. In the past Erotic Art was used to show sexual encounters and to illustrate stories and the importance of sex in their cultures. Pornography has become its own culture, they now have award shows to celebrate the ‘bests of’ the porn industry.

It seems that Pornography keeps on growing where as Erotic Art continues to have to fight for its place in public, it is commonly mistaken for pornography. Which leads to the question, what makes Erotic Art, Erotic Art and not Pornography? As stated previously in the essay one of the most important differences between Erotic Art and Pornography is in the feelings shared between the people participating in the sexual acts. Erotic Art usually depicts people who share deep feelings for one another, which leads them to make love to one another. Erotic Art shows the importance of these acts in several different cultures and represents the sexual acts in beautiful settings, which have just as much detail as the people conducting these sexual acts. Pornography is images, videos and magazines that are made specifically so that the people looking at them will be aroused. The pornography industry has men and women who make money by showing they having sex or touching them. Pornography shows the crude nature that comes with sex without love, and is usually risqué and not very beautiful.

Women in Erotic Art are usually women with natural beauty and curves while the women in pornography start looking more and more unnatural. Women in the porn industry are trying to make themselves more interesting and fill men’s sexual fantasies by getting plastic surgery and making parts of their bodies larger than they should be. Erotic Art celebrates natural beauty and pornography feeds into the male fantasy woman.