Destricted

In case you didn't know (I didn't) this month marks the 20th anniversary of The Decency Clause. As part of the program called How Obscene is This! The Decency Clause Turns 20 (so-called "obscene" language is the only form of expression not covered by the First Amendment) the National Coalition Against Censorship screened part of Destricted, a collection of short films by artists exploring the boundaries between porn and art. The moderator when introducing the film, consoled the audience by reminding them that these films have screened at The Tate and Cannes, so we can all be reassured that we aren't just a bunch of pervs watching dirty movies.

For example:

Death Valley by Sam Taylor-Wood: A guy jacking off alone in the desert = porn. A guy jacking off alone in the desert with a soundtrack of spooky, ambient electronic music = art

House Call by Richard Prince: a porn movie = porn. A video of a porn movie on a t.v. with a soundtrack of spooky, ambient music = art.

I don't mean to sound glib, both films were moving and engaging in their own way, but it's interesting to see blatant, clear sex on screen and how different the experiences would be in a porn theater -vs- an art school auditorium. How long do we spend with our hands on our chins, nodding and critiquing before we admit that we've gotten wet or hard.

Maybe it's because I've seen too much, but I find so much of porn (even the alternative, indie porn) is just kind of, well... boring. Penis in hole, tongue on clit, fist in ass; there are only so many ways to shoot it. I get it. People are having sexual intercourse for me to watch. To me, Green Pink Caviar by Marilyn Minter is so much dirtier. Maybe it's because I'm not quite sure what I'm seeing and I don't know exactly what is happening and why. Plus, it's oddly beautiful. The same with Hoist by Matthew Barney. You're watching very explicit sex, but in a form that's totally foreign with a visual vocabulary that's uniquely his.

I like a little porn in my art and a little art in my porn. I like my perceptions of sexuality twisted and my conceptions of art challenged. If you couldn't make it to the screening, some of the films will be released on DVD some time this year.

Also included:

Four Letter Heaven by Cecily Brown
Sync by Marco Brambilla
Balkan Erotic Epic by Marina Abramović
Impaled by Larry Clark
We Fuck Alone by Gaspar Noé

Soyent Green

Not too long ago I rented Soylent Green (1973). Spoiler alert: it's people. It takes place in the not-too distant dystopian future where fresh fruits and vegetables are a rarity, poverty is rampant, strawberry jam costs $150 a jar, and the rich live in luxury condos complete with "furniture". The furniture being sexy ladies who come with the apartment along with the refrigerator and washer/dryer set. Tenants may come and go, but the condo-hos remain fixtures, there to please whoever happens to live there. Not a bad gig if you ask me.

Todd Haynes: Poison

Givenchy

Cartier Love Cuff

Update of the famous Love Bracelet: The original provocative bracelet
-created in the 1970's- which could only be opened with a tiny
screwdriver. It soon became a piece of cult jewelery for modern day Lovers.

Hello Kitty

Hello Kitty is an icon that doesn't stand for anything at all. Hello Kitty never has been, and never will be, anything. She's pure license; you can even get a Hello Kitty car! The branding thing is completely out of control, but it started as nothing and maintains its nothingness. It's not about the ego, and in that way it's very Japanese. — Tom Sachs


Bronze Collection / Lever House, New York City / 2008

Artist Tom Sachs often references contemporary icons of popular culture and consumerism in his work: McDonald's, Prada, Hello Kitty. I saw him speak at a conference years ago with Ikuko Shimizu, the original creator of Hello Kitty (let me tell you, when she took the stage the whole audience stood up and roared with applause. She's a rock star). She had never seen any of his work and was genuinely surprised that her creation had such a huge cultural impact. She said humbly, "Well, I knew it was a very popular character."

I was a fan of Hello Kitty back when I was a 3rd grader collecting stickers and miniature colored pencil sets and I love her to this day. "Teen Angst Hello Kitty" (I'm not making that up, that's what it's called) hangs above my computer:




On my wall is a piece from artist Michael Paulus who draws skeletal systems of cartoon characters:



I love Hello Kitty for her minimalist lines, her over-sized head, her expressionless, speechless gaze (She has no mouth, but there's no deep meaning behind this. When asked, Shimizu said she could never get the drawings right so she said, forget it!). Her adorable blank stare is like a template inviting you apply anything you want to her surface. And Hello Kitty is most definitely a she. You don't need DD sized boobs or long blond hair and a dream house. She's got that sweet, little bow placed at a cocky angle just below her left ear. And, or course, the name. How can you resist? The awkward, broken English name that is both generic and completely unique. You can not help but love her.

So we want her little face on anything and everything that can be bought instantly transforming the most mundane, utilitarian, "grown-up" object into something kitschy, fun and cute taking us back to a more innocent time in our lives when we carried Lego pieces, secret notes, and glitter glue in our little purses instead of iPhones, credit cards and tampons.

So along with the obligatory and age appropriate tiny purses and diaries, you can buy Hello Kitty kitchen timers, license plate frames, toasters, stainless steel sauce pans, golf bags, digital cameras, coffee makers, diamond jewelry, a Fender guitar and makeup . Then you can fly to Japan on a Hello Kitty jet.



















So why not a vibrator? It's marketed as a "shoulder massager" (so is the Hitachi and all those hand vibes you get at Brookstone) maintaining the illusion of respectability. Sanrio has always maintained that it is a "health-care product". It was their best selling novelty item before it was discontinued when it ended up being sold in sex shops next to much more obviously adult toys. But since it's back, perhaps the company has loosened up, re-evaluated it's consumer and decided to innocently look the other way.

After all, anything that vibrates is a vibrator: an electric toothbrush, the dryer, Tickle Me Elmo. I remember, while vacuuming the living room rug as a youngster, curiously pressing the buzzing handle to my crotch. Part of the fun is the pervertability of the object, the sacrilege of taking a beloved childhood character and using it to get off.

But long story short, it's basically a "Pocket Rocket" with a Hello Kitty head on top. So I started with her little face respectfully turned away from my clitoris. The back of her head is round and smooth, with just the slightest, embossement: © '76/97 SANRIO MADE IN CHINA. But I was curious about all those bumps of her cocky pink bow, her yellow button nose, and that little teddy bear nestled safely between her legs. So, with a little hesitation, I turned her over rubbing her face over my clit until I came. Then I lifted her up from between my damp thighs and looked into those tiny, little black eyes that seemed to be looking into mine saying, Why? Why?!

And it takes one AA battery.

Dungeons and Dungeons

Our Lady of the Flowers

Our Lady of the Flowers by Jean Genet
(created in part while in a straight-jacket)

Fuck Machines

Fickmaschinen (Fuck Machines) from Matt Lambert on Vimeo.

The Slap Heard Around Basic Cable

I was addicted to Mad Men from day one of course, so I eagerly awaited the season premiere with a martini and cigarettes in hand. They walk through the brand new office (brighter colors, louder music, new logo) I thought, "Yes! Here we go."

And then the slap and I thought, "Oh fuck yeah, here we go!"

But after the initial shock of the hot I thought, "Hmmm, okay..."

And then, "Oh great, I'm going to have to say something about this aren't I?"

It's not a new concept: the man in charge of everything pays a woman to take charge over him. The man with all the power wants to feel powerless. The man who knows he's been a bad boy wants to be punished. Don is a man riddled with guilt and shame. The scene was a way to say, "See! See how riddled with guilt and shame he is!" In a way, it was kind of inevitable.

Which is why I'm glad they did it. It was ballsy and yeah, pretty hot. It was a big blast of extra sexy in a show that's already pretty damn sexy. It's an interesting development of this character and I am curious to see if they actually expand on this beyond this one moment at the first episode, but really I've got my eyes on Peggy.

Other thoughts:

New York Magazine
The Daily Beast
Sexuality Blog

901 Tequila

Foot Locker

X-ray

Ad Agency: Butter, Berlin/Duesseldorf, Germany


I've really gotten into this trend of the lecture as entertainment. You couldn't get me to the Meatpacking district on a Friday night if you paid me, but give me a glass of Trader Joe's Cabernet and a slide show and I'm all yours. My new favorite place in the whole wide world is the Observatory and a while ago I was tempted by the title of this talk:

The Anatomical Unconscious: X-Ray Specs, Visible Women, and the Eros of the Unseen An illustrated lecture with cult author and cultural critic Mark Dery. He went from the Chemical Brothers to baroque medical mannequins and everything in between and it got me thinking about x-rays and intimacy and what it means to really see through someone. I mean, really see through someone.

In Dennis Cooper's Frisk, the protagonist, obsessed with sex and death, attempts to articulate his desire to mutilate the hustler he just fucked:

I want to know everything about you. But to really do that, I'd have to kill you, as bizarre as that sounds.

I mean, I know there's no God. People are only their bodies, and sex is the ultimate intimacy, etc., but it's not enough. Like you. I find what I know about you amazing, so amazing I can't get beyond my awe. So part of me wants to dismantle that awe or whatever, and see how you work. But I know that's selfish. Your life's as important as anyone's, including mine... so, I'm stuck.


10 Robbie Williams - Rock DJ (Uncut) [2000]
Uploaded by liquiddreams54. - Music videos, artist interviews, concerts and more.

The x-ray spec ads in the back of old comics tease with the power to see through dresses and full-slips, not through skin. It was the tantalizing suggestion of seeing something you shouldn't be able to see and getting away with it. There's been such hoopla over the new full-body x-ray machines at airports because they show a little too much, an indication of flesh not just skeletons and metal hip replacements. But it's not being naked either.

It's beyond naked.

I think one of the reasons people get into play with bodily fluids (spit, blood, piss) is that it's from the inside of someone and in the case of blood play (unless is menstrual blood) it's not supposed to be on the outside.

Years ago a friend of mine was shopping for a a little gift for her boyfriend. His knee had been injured long ago in an accident and it always gave him trouble. She found the perfect thing: a replica of a human knee cap.

I thought that was really sweet.

Album art

Edward VII's Love Seat

Hear My Name

Catherine Opie

Mary Coble

Marina Abramović

I sat on the floor of MoMA, my butt sore from the previous nights caning and watched Marina Abramović for the final two and a half hours of her marathon performance in which she sat in a chair for the entire length of her retrospective The Artist is Present while the public was invited to sit silently across from her: 75 days, 736 hours and 30 minutes, and over 1,500 sitters. It was my second time there, the first time was about seeing the work in the show itself, the second time was about seeing her.

As the clock ticked closer and closer to 5:00, the excitement, tension, security guards and camera crews increased. Klaus Biesenbach (director of PS.1) the last sitter, rose from the chair when his time was up and kissed her on both cheeks. Marina dropped to her knees and then stood to a roar of applause and cheers from the crowd. The chairs were taken away and she did a little Mary Tyler Moore turn as the group of lab coat clad volunteers who had been recreating her work a floor above surrounded her. Surprisingly energetic and alert, she looked like someone had just presented her with a giant birthday cake with her name on it. It was beautiful.

Over the past couple of months, I'd gotten to know more of her work and found myself effected by it in a way I haven't experienced with a piece of art in a long time, meaning kind of turned on.

It really all came together when I saw The Artist is Absent in which Abramović's performances were recreated by people from NYC’s radical queer underground and BDSM / kinky communities. Seeing these works being performed in person was so much more powerful and seeing them performed by people of so many different genders, colors and sizes made it even more thought provoking and well... hot.

Some examples of her performances:

Rhythmn 0
Various objects (including perfume, a flower, a knife, a whip, a gun and a single bullet) are placed on a table with a sign saying:

There are 72 objects on the table that one can use on me as desired.
I am the object.
During this period I take full responsibility.


Breathing In / Breathing Out (Marina and Ulay pictured above):
We are kneeling face to face,
pressing our mouths together.

Our noses are blocked with filtertips.

Ulay
I am breathing in oxygen.
I am breathing out carbon dioxide.

Marina
I am breathing in oxygen.
I am breathing out carbon dioxide.

Ulay
I am breathing in oxygen.
I am breathing out carbon dioxide.


Light / Dark
We kneel face to face.
Our faces are lit by two strong lamps.
Alternately, we slap each other's faces until one of us stops.


Relation in Time
Two people sit back to back, tied together by their hair, unmoving (17 hours)

Of course, these are just a few examples of decades worth of work and not all of them have such blatant kinky connections. But most of her work does deal with pushing the limits of the mind and body in one way or another and as a kinkster, it was worth seeing a master at work.



The End

R.I.P Louise Bourgeois

Story of the Eye

Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille

collaboration w/ Jefferson photo by Michael Meyer Photography

Madonna vs Christina

Christina Aguilera, 2010


Madonna, 1995

I was browsing a kinky community forum online and one member posted this Christina Aguilera video. Every time we see a hot woman in a leather catsuit wielding a riding crop in a video or commercial or t.v. show, there's often a spark of recognition followed by the debate:

Is she's another poseur ripping off my culture for commercial gain?
Does this mean BDSM is going mainstream?
But I like being apart from the mainstream. I like not being "normal."
But more exposure means more understanding and less persecution and judgement.

Do I give a shit because the outfits are awesome?

In Madonna's Human Nature, she sings specifically about sexuality free from shame, so it makes sense. Yeah, it's not the most subtle of metaphors (boxed in, tied up), but it's a video not a Ingmar Bergman movie.

Christina's Not Myself Tonight is a tribute (rip-off) of Madonna's videos (I counted three, plus a George Michael) with a much bigger styling budget and blatant product placement. It's another one of those "I'm feeling extra wild and sexy tonight so watch out world!" songs and everyone knows wild and sexy = latex catsuit and a riding crop.

As a black person, I'm pretty well used to the idea of one's identity being commercialized. Just like black became shorthand for cool, is kink just becoming shorthand for hot?

But kink isn't just an outfit: it's culture, identity, politics, community...

But that zipper gag thing and those pointy eyelashes are so rad and she's sporting a Betony Vernon Petting Ring.

So, who cares. It's hot.

Right?

Charlie's Angels

Drunk Girls

Limits

I'm not an athlete. I don't climb mountains or run marathons. The most working out I do these days is Rhythm Boxing and fake Tennis on my Wii. But I do know something about pushing the body past it's limits, of doing things that according to basic rules of biology, I shouldn't be doing. Much of BSDM is about going beyond those places (mentally, emotionally, psychologically) of reason and seeing just how far we can go before we break.

R.I.P Malcom McLaren

The Incest Museum

Simon Fujiwara

Furniture Bondage

Melanie Bonajo

Specimens

Airside

Alex Merto


Luke Lucas


Oded Ezer


Thijs Verbeek


Thor

CineKink '10

I am a film buff. I absolutely love the cinema. I eat, drink, and breathe movies. I'm one of those people who prefer to go to movies alone. I sit dead center, sink down until my head is resting on the back of the seat and lose myself in some other world for a couple of hours in the dark. I love all kinds of movies, I'm not a snob about it. From M to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, from A Streetcar Named Desire to Showgirls. I'll see it all. Netflix is one of the best things that has ever happened to me.

So I was pretty excited when CineKink came along. I went last year, but was only able to go to a few screenings. This time, I'm determined to see as much as I can. I'll be updating this post as I go along, putting in my two cents for what it's worth.

If you haven't gotten tickets for any shows yet, I highly recommend you do. Films depicting kinky folks in a positive and respectful light are too few and far between and these film makers need our support!



Day 1
It started off at the opening party with a screening of the 1964 short 400 Blow Jobs (get it?) by JX Williams. It's a light-hearted and lovely assemblage of stag films, stock footage and a smidgen of A Trip to the Moon. It's one of those rare pieces you just never see anywhere else and I'm so glad they included it in the programing. Also, screened was Sheep and the Ranch Hand by Loretta Hintz (2009), a clever and fun interspecies roll in the hay.

Day 2
The festival opener was S&M Judge by Erik Lamens (2009) and is based on a true story. I, like many people in the audience, was extremely touched by this film. First and foremost, it's a love story and one of incredible devotion. But it also shows how easily lives can fall apart when the judicial system enters the bedroom. It touches on issues with family, privacy, vengeance, and the DSM.

But along with the big issues, some of the loveliest moments for me were the scenes showing Koen and Magda as beginners, their foibles and nervous baby steps and the hesitancy from Koen, a reluctant sadist. There were many knowing laughs from the audience at various, "I've been there!" moments, but I didn't laugh. I got the insider jokes, but I was right there with Koen feeling the awkwardness, the disbelief, and the desire to please and protect.

If you weren't able to see it, got to the website and read up on the story and donate to the NCSF!

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to catch Body Modification Freaks by Mitutika Fuku (2009), but next up is the shorts program Kinda Kinky? and Waxie Moon by Wes Hurley (2009).

(Note to self: practice writing notes in the dark.)

Day 3
The great thing about the shorts program is that I now have a laundry list of new kinky to-dos. Kinda Kinky? was a nice mix of ethereal slices of life, comedy, drama, music, documentary and porn. You don't always need an hour and a half to tell a compelling story.

Some stand outs for me were Handcuffs by Erika Lust (2009), a gorgeous, super sexy, slice of voyeurism. Beautifully shot in soft colors, dim light, and beautiful clothes, it looks like a moving Ellen von Unwerth photo. Walking the Dog by Luigi Campi (2009) was a complex look at voyeurism, power shifts and kinky awakening. It's interesting how so many films about BDSM are all about its discovery. Libidoland by Julie Keck and Jessica King (2009) started off funny and sweet and morphed into an incredibly tense and frightening reminder that while we might call it "play", there can be very serious consequences. One of the more interesting aspects of this short was how our fantasies can move from the most extreme adventures to the most everyday comfort. The Great Humpkin by Stewart McCullough (2008) proves that sex in stop motion animation is both hilarious and hot and thanks to Balloons by Charles Nuckolls (2009) I really, really want to get inside a balloon. Seriously. If anyone out there in NYC does this, e-mail me because it looks awesome!

The full-length film for the evening was the documentary Waxie Moon by Wes Hurley (2009) and now I am completely in love! I've never even heard of the term "boylesque", but it's a great look at a truly innovative talent who tears apart traditional notions of gender in a primarily female dominated genre. His performances were nothing like I'd ever seen in burlesque before. They're strange, uncomfortable, dramatic, sexual and fun! A Julliard trained dancer in thigh-high platform boots, a shaved head, a horseshoe mustache sparking with glitter and pasties on his nipples is a man I want to know. I hope he does a show in New York because I'll be first one in line.

Day 4
Lured by the possibilities of a paying job, I am unfortunately missing a few screenings today. While it would be fun to watch Madison Young on the big screen, I like paying my rent a little bit more. But I did make two screenings last night and I should say that the quality of the feature films so far have been the best I've seen from CineKink.

I really liked Modern Love Is Automatic by Zach Clark (2008) because in essence it wasn't really about kink. Yes, it's the story of a woman who becomes a dominatrix and her model wannabe roommate. But really it's about two women searching for something in themselves and finding some of what they need in each other. As the ultimate control freak, the distant and disconnected Lorraine, is longing for connection and while terrified of emotion ultimately wants to feel... something. Her polar opposite roommate Adrian is the ever optimist, bubbly and lively, overcompensating for her immense need to be loved, to be beautiful and to be desirable. Lorraine hardly speaks throughout the entire film, it's her clothes and mannerism and habits that speak for her and watching her achingly slow crawl to a breakthrough was a little painful, but at the end it was worth it.

Swingers is yet another film about change and a woman's transformation through kink. I was pleasantly surprised. I don't know a lot about swinging. I'm not married, so I've never swapped husbands with anyone before, but I do know something about what happens when communication stops and insecurities creep in. I went in thinking it would be a simple film about a couples first time with another more experienced couple, but it ended up being a lot more complex. This "communication" thing us non-monogamous and poly people talk about isn't as simple as just "opening up". Sometimes it's not as easy to walk the walk and talk the talk.

So, I am going to go buy some Power Bars and take a nap and because there's lots, lots more tonight.

Day 5
I don't know how those folks at Sundance do it. I am kinky movied out! Yesterday I missed a few, but did catch the last two shorts programs:

Fixated featured some really interesting themes: a very moving film about man who gets off on footage from 9/11 called Coverage, an elderly woman's fixation with food leads to a renewed faith in love in Hungry for Love, and even a great middle-finger pointed towards the CEO of Goldman Sachs in Lloyd Blankfein Must Die.

I was less impressed with the line-up in Yes, Mistress. For me the films that had broader themes about life and relationships were more interesting than the films that were simply examples of people doing kinky things. The one exception for me was Anti-Samaritan Hotline, which was as funny as it was disturbing. I think Madison Young (Perversions of Lesbian Lust 2) is fantastic, but I can watch porn at home. I skipped the Bring It! series for that reason. Maybe it's because I don't watch a lot of porn and when I do it's maybe only 5 minutes worth.

This years CineKink was the best I've seen. I didn't love everything I saw, but as a whole the quality and diversity of films has gotten much, much better. What was really great was that so many of the film makers weren't into BDSM themselves! It's so good to see positive images of kinky people, not as villains or as comic relief, but as ordinary folks with all of the complexity as anyone else.

I was introduced to some great independent film makers, got some fun new ideas and was left with a lot to think about both as a kinky and a creative person.

So at that, it's a wrap!

R.I.P Alexander McQueen

The Night Porter

The Night Porter (1974)

Important Things: Safety

Important Things with Demetri Martin
Safety - Deleted Scenes
www.comedycentral.com
Joke of the Day Stand-Up Comedy Free Online Games

The Moderns

Sex Madonna (1992)

I was at a screening for the film Helvetica a while ago and after the movie there was a Q&A with the director and many of the participants in the film. One audience member asked Massimo Vignelli, "If you could be a type face which one would you be?"

Vignelli answered, "Helvetica in the day and Bodoni at night."



Bodoni was designed by Giambattista Bodoni around 1798. It's a modern typeface, with flat, unbracketed serifs and an extreme contrast between the thick and thin strokes. Like it's predecessor Didot, it is removed from the sweeping serifs that mimicked the quill and gestures of the hand. Born out of the Industrial Revolution it would become the standard for fashion and beauty for years to come.



It is precise, crisp, and unflinching.



It is warm, elegant, and sensuous.



The moderns are delicate, but harsh. They're inhuman but sexy. Bodoni is alluring in it's contrasts of generous curves and honed edges. It's the typographic equivalent of a knife blade over the arc of a hip.

Do the robot!

Last night I was watching t.v. and an ad came on for some car company. I don't know which one, I don't really care about cars, but they showed an assembly line with those rows and rows of yellow painted robot arms all tinkering in unison and because I am the kind of person that I am, I thought, "That's kind of hot".

I've always been fascinated by machinery. I always linger by construction sites when the cranes are in motion. I love those impossibly gigantic earth moving machines. Oily gears and metal chains have always turned my crank. Crash by J.G. Ballard is one of my favorite books. Then add to all that the suggestion of human activity. After all, these machines are replacing what human hands used to do. They are huge, yet doing the most delicate precise movements. They are bulky, but glide gracefully like ballet dancers that have had their feet nailed to the floor. They're all in unison like a Busby Berkeley* choreography each with it's own very specific task it does perfectly over and over and over again.



* There is so much in this little clip to talk about but I'll leave it up to someone else.

Paul Insect

Skeleton Table by Paul Insect

The Libertine (1969)

bebelestrange: La Matriarca (The Libertine) - 1969 (hop on pop... - Watch more Music Videos at Vodpod.

(this was the only video I could find online, but there are English subtitles)

In The Libertine, a newly widowed young woman discovers her husbands secret swinging kinky sex pad and decides to make it her own. She goes through an encyclopedia of abnormal sexuality trying out kinks one by one with a new hair-do and outfit for each one.

It's also why I now refer to my apartment as The Fornicatorium.