Erotic art is a broad field of the visual arts that includes any artistic work intended to evoke arousal. It usually depicts human nudity or sexual activity, and has included works in various visual mediums, including drawings, engravings, films, paintings, photographs, and sculptures. Some of the earliest known works of art include erotic themes, which have recurred with varying prominence in different societies throughout history. However, it has also been widely considered taboo, with either social norms or laws restricting its creation, distribution, and possession. This is particularly the case when it is deemed pornographic, immoral, or obscene.
Jeff Jahn is a curator, art critic, artist, historian, blogger and composer based in Portland, Oregon, United States. He coined the phrase declaring Portland "the capital of conscience for the United States," in a Portland Tribune op-ed piece, which was then reiterated in The Wall Street Journal.
HUMP! is an annual film festival founded by Dan Savage in 2005. HUMP! describes itself as "the world's best amateur porn film festival." The festival—which premiered in Seattle, Washington, and Portland, Oregon—showcases home-movie erotica, amateur sex cinema, and locally produced pornography, all of which must be five minutes or less. Films are rated by the audience, and awards are given.
The Northwest African American Museum (NAAM) serves to present and preserve the connections between the Pacific Northwest and people of African descent and investigate and celebrate Black experiences in America through exhibitions, programs and events. The museum is located in Seattle, Washington's historically African-American Central District neighborhood in the former Colman School, with official status as a City of Seattle landmark. The building also contains 36 units of affordable housing.
Humpday is a 2009 American mumblecore comedy-drama film directed, produced, and written by Lynn Shelton and starring Mark Duplass, Joshua Leonard, and Alycia Delmore. It premiered at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival. International distribution rights were purchased by Magnolia Pictures for a mid-six figure sum. The film opened in New York City in a limited release on July 10, 2009. The story line follows two male heterosexual best friends, Ben and Andrew. The plot line centers around a "mutual dare" that is introduced at a party, which involves the two main characters engaging in a pornographic film together. The film was shot on-location in Washington state around Seattle from September 2008 to January 2009, and much of the dialogue for the film was improvised.
Madison Young is an American filmmaker, author, performance artist, feminist activist, and former adult film performer and award-winning erotic filmmaker. Young is a prominent figure in the feminist porn movement and is known for their work as a queer and kink-focused educator and an advocate of sex workers' rights.
ArtPrize is an art competition and festival in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Anyone over the age of 18 can display their art, and any space within the three-square-mile ArtPrize district can be a venue. There are typically over 160 venues such as museums, galleries, bars, restaurants, hotels, public parks, bridges, laundromats, auto body shops, and more.
Mathaf: Arab Museum of Modern Art is a museum in Doha, Qatar with over 9,000 objects. Established in 2010, it is considered a major cultural attraction in the country.
The Center for Sex Positive Culture (CSPC), formerly known as The Wet Spot, is a non-profit, membership-based organization located in Seattle, Washington. It organizes events and provides space for several sex-positive subcultures, notably BDSM, swinging, and polyamory groups. CSPC welcomes people of all sexual identities and seeks to encompass all consensual sexual practices. The Center is a 501(c)(7) recreational club; its sister organization, the Foundation for Sex Positive Culture is a 501(c)(3) charitable/educational organization.
Gregory Euclide is an American contemporary artist and teacher who lives and works outside of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
The Africa Centre, in Cape Town, South Africa, is structured as a not-for-profit organisation whose purpose is to provide a platform for Pan-African arts and cultural practice to function as a catalyst for social change. All the projects it conducts, facilitates or supports have some social intention. These projects are supported by a variety of Pan-African artists.
Apexart is a non-profit art space located in Lower Manhattan, New York. The organization, founded by Steven Rand in 1994, combines spaces for creative endeavor and curation to encourage experimentation and innovation. apexart offers several open call programs intended to even the playing field between applicants, diversify experience and perspective, and push back against the commercialization of art.
Nguyen Phuong Linh is a Vietnamese born, Hanoi-based conceptual artist. Nguyen Phuong Linh's multidisciplinary practice spans installation, sculpture and video. Her work conveys the sense of the alienation, the dislocation and the ephemerality of human life.
The Center on Contemporary Art (CoCA) is a non-profit arts organization located in Seattle, Washington. CoCA was founded in 1980 by a group of artists, art patrons, and arts activists. Since its inaugural exhibition (James Turrell's "Four Light Installations", 1982, at the Lippy Building in Pioneer Square), CoCA has provided continuous programming that presents work by both established and emerging artists. CoCA originally existed without a permanent gallery space, and the organization has since inhabited numerous locations in Seattle. Its most recent location, as of September 2016, is the Tashiro Kaplan Building in historic Pioneer Square. Today, CoCA serves the community through exhibitions, artist residencies, publications, and discussions.
12 Inches of Sin is a globally recognized annual art exhibition based in Las Vegas, which since its inception in 2010, has focused on exploring facets of human identity, sexuality, gender, and artistic expression. The exhibition accepts a wide range of art forms such as paintings, photographs, digital art, sculpture, illustration, mixed media and short films, all adhering to a specific rule: each piece should not exceed 12 inches in any dimension. Out of all submissions, 36 artists are selected by a panel of 12 esteemed judges. To date, artists from 26 countries have participated in this exhibition.
Anna Frants is a Russian-American multimedia artist, curator, and art collector. She is the founder of nonprofit cultural foundation "Cyland Foundation Inc." and "CYLAND" MediaArtLab, and is director of "Frants Gallery".
Sina Ataeian Dena is an Iranian-German film director, screenwriter and film producer and artist.
Barbara Noah is an artist who currently works with digital prints and mixed media, with past work in public art, photography, painting, print, and sculpture.
Folayemi "Fo" Debra Wilson is an American interdisciplinary artist, designer, and academic administrator. Her practice includes work as a furniture designer and maker, installation artist, muralist, and graphic designer. Wilson is the first associate dean for access and equity in the Penn State College of Arts and Architecture.
The Tephra Fine Arts Festival is a juried major outdoor visual arts show held annually since 1991 on the streets of the Reston Town Center in Reston, Virginia and sponsored by the Tephra Institute of Contemporary Art, formerly known as the Greater Reston Arts Center.
