Thirsting For A New Erotic

Written by Violet Marie Ames

Edited by Joshua Beutum

‘Are you lost babygirl?’

This is an iconic phrase from the 365 Days trilogy. In the era of COVID—when the online collective was in dire need of respite from the weight of societal collapse—the memes that followed were ones I often return to when mulling over the current state of erotic art-making.

The erotic, in a broader sense, has often been synonymous with a more implicit form of sexuality, what may be affectionately termed soft porn. However, this is just scraping the surface of what is a deeply nuanced conversation. In Greek mythology, Eros is born of Chaos. It would seem that as primordial as the Big Bang and the creation of the Universe, so has the erotic existed; with close associates, Pothos (Longing) and Himenos (Desire) in tow.

The erotic is sensual, story-driven, intimate, and—often,but not always—tinged with romanticism. Sensuality, by its very nature, involves the use of all senses, and the pleasure therein—a sort of epicurean delight which is met by fine food, fine clothing, beauty, and musicality. Which is perhaps why your average romance novel makes as much use of the page to describe lavish surroundings and circumstances, as much as it revels in describing steamy encounters.

It is perhaps a genre in-crisis. One can hardly take the Tube in Central London without being drenched in adverts promoting the new Magic Mike. The critic in me is begging to tear down the posters, so that they never see the light of day, due to cheap perversion of a presumably female and/or queer desire.

This evidence of tactless marketing poses ideological dis-ease for patrons of Audre Lorde and her ilk, who argued against implementing the mere mimicry of existing patriarchal structures in future art-making. Lorde writes in her seminal essay, Uses of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power that, “The erotic is a resource within each of us that lies in a deeply and spiritual plane, firmly rooted in the power of our unexpressed or unrecognized feeling…We have been taught to suspect this resource, vilified, abused, and devalued within western society.” She then goes on to argue that in order to bypass this mediocrity of sensation without feeling, which is inherent in porn, we must demand excellence, so that we can experience the embodied fullness of the erotic in all areas of our life.

It seems that Lorde’s view of porn can hardly be refuted as the proof is in the pudding – porn is currently the de facto source of sex in visual culture. Rather than representing sexual acts through the lens of complex human emotion, we are confronted with scenes shot in 4K. There is nothing inherently problematic with this way of shooting, but it certainly speaks to how the Instagram aesthetic has become the lens through which we envision and interpret the world of sex. Is this the mediocrity to which Lorde remarks on, and ultimately anticipates?

Another piece missing from the modern erotic is its unique blend of innocence and camp. By so self-consciously trying to recreate the financial success of Fifty Shades of Grey or spark a conversation, it seems that movie execs have taken to further exacerbating this dissonance for the audience. In ‘Notes on Camp’ Susan Sontag writes, “Pure Camp is always naive. Camp which knows itself to be Camp (“camping”) is usually less satisfying.” Perhaps the dilemma is not in the unserious nature of current erotic storytelling, but in its overly self-conscious way of doing so.

But that doesn’t mean other forms of erotica haven’t been able to thrive. The world of BookTok has been the source of such reprisal, with mixed results — the hype over Colleen Hoover’s It Ends With Us online is partially what gave rise to its filmic representation, though that ultimately ended as a media travesty.

It should be noted that all aesthetic preferences are a matter of taste. Sontag underscores this when she writes, “There is taste in people, visual taste, taste in emotion — and there is taste in acts, taste in morality. Intelligence, as well, is really a kind of taste: taste in ideas.” And why shouldn’t we be picky when it comes to the kinds of media we consume? Why do we have to merely accept what is presented before us, especially when it impacts how we see the world?

In the same vein of being pressured by your peers to settle on a romantic partner, we have a right to refute the lacklustre erotica society attempts to serve us on a silver platter. In the eternal words of Cher Horowitz, “You see how picky I am about my shoes — and they only go on my feet!” I’m of the aesthetic opinion that erotica should challenge our pre-conceptions of intimacy, that it ought stir something within our collective psyche and if so lucky, maybe even our soul.

There is a false dichotomy within the heteropatriarchy, that sex can only exist within the confines of a committed monogamous romantic relationship or as illicit affairs consisting only of the emotionally devoid meeting of parts. But on this continuum, there is nuance. A brief encounter with a stranger can be loving and sincere. ‘Loving partners’ in a twenty-year-plus marriage can be frigid and unemotional. As ‘B’ of Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac notes, “The secret ingredient to sex is love.”

Whether in the form of a monogamous relationship or not, love is everywhere. Love in all its magnitude, has the ability to take on a myriad of forms, beyond the romantic or sexual. It can be platonic, familial, or community-based. Which is what Lorde argues in favour of, by framing the erotic as pleasure received by sharing any pursuit with another, be it physical, emotional, spiritual, psychic, or intellectual.

Compassion and respect between partners is its own kind of love. Even if it’s spoken in a language that the rest of us can’t quite make out. Famed French-American erotic writer, Anaïs Nin exemplifies this with her storytelling by devising her own system of empathy and understanding, even when the subject matter itself is laden in taboo and controversy — think voyeurism and pulling a quickie at a public execution. She provides a balanced perspective by providing the reader with a sort of scintillating shock value, while at the same time displaying an acute understanding of the emotions and inner workings of her characters.

There’s something exciting about how she sees desire as beyond pure objectification. Something consciously intellectual: she aims to enlighten and educate us for the betterment of our experience of pleasure and relationships, moreover. In Delta of Venus, she writes, “I want my eroticism mixed with love. And deep love one does not often experience.”

I too, want my eroticism mixed with love. I want it mixed with sincerity and vulnerability, with equal measures of play and light-heartedness. We should be more demanding in our aesthetic tastes. Our preferences, which allow us to engage with and understand the current cultural zeitgeist, also titillate us and make us feel alive. “Passion gives me moments of wholeness,” so Nin writes.