Jiří Růžek is one of the word’s best glamor and erotic photographers. He is described by critics and fans alike as an artist who has redefined the genre by producing fine art out of glamor photography.

Růžek considers himself just a photographer who takes nude portraits. He describes his work as Uglamour—a term he made up from the words “Ugly” and “Glamour.” He says his intention is to create “natural and straightforward photographs showing true and believable emotions.” This is what makes his photographs stand out and why many describe his work as fine art.

Born fifty years ago in Litoměřice, Czech Republic, Růžek is now based in Prague where he runs a studio, a workshop, and an exhibition space. His work has been exhibited across the globe and published in magazines and books by the likes of Taschen, Random House, Gmbh, and Constable & Robinson. Even with all this success, Růžek still finds time to run group and one-to-one photographic courses and private shoots.

But you really don’t need to know all this unless, of course, you wanna sign-up for a workshop or maybe be one of his photographic models. What I really want to share is Růžek’s gorgeous erotic 3-D Anaglyphs. These photos are stereoscopic pictures made from two red and cyan filtered colored images. Růžek’s 3-D photos have a sensuous beauty that recalls Edward Weston‘s nudes or Helmut Newton‘s provocative erotica but all are captured with Růžek’s own style. You’ll need your 3-D glasses to get the full effect.

See more of Jiří Růžek’s work here.
 

 

 

 
See more eye-catching 3-D beauty, after the jump…

‘Sorry to Disturb, but can one of you hand me out that light gray topcoat? ‘
 
I suppose we’ll just have to say Philip Larkin’s poem was wrong. Sexual intercourse didn’t begin “in ninteen-sixty-three / Between the end of the “Chatterley ban / And the Beatles’ first LP.” It had been going on in polite society for a hell of lot longer than that. Probably as far back as VE Day and Sinatra’s first LP—though I concede not too many people would have known about it.

If Larkin had been paying attention, then he might have just known 1963 was, in fact, the year the great English pornographic artist, Tom Poulton died. But only a few dozen would have probably marked his passing and an even smaller number would have ever been aware of Poulton’s secret life as an erotic artist.

You see, Poulton, or Tom of England, was a highly respectable illustrator for science and medical textbooks, guides to fishing and other sensible books. But in secret, he also produced a staggering amount of hardcore pornographic drawings featuring supple young bodies relishing the joyful pleasures of sexual intercourse. He kept this work hidden as he feared he would be prosecuted for obscenity and his respectable life would come to a rather sudden and humiliating halt. However, Poulton did have a few very rich and influential patrons who secretly collected his erotic work—most notably the yachtsman and playboy Beecher Moore.

Poulton was inspired to produce erotica in the 1940s after being stationed in India where he first came into contact with the explicit illustrations of the Kama Sutra. Poulton’s drawings are equally as explicit but are often humorous and all are filled with a great joy, a gleeful relish, for the pleasures of sex

It was only after Poulton’s death in 1963 that his secret sketchbooks came to light. Then in the 1990s, Beecher Moore sold a considerable part of his large collection of erotic drawings which brought a new generation to Poulton’s work and started a reappraisal of his career as an artist. If you want to know more about Tom Poulton then I recommend you beg, steal, or borrow or even just buy a copy of Jamie MacLean’s book Tom Pulton: The Secret Art of an English Gentleman.
 

‘Please, Lady Brisere, You’re Suffocating Me!’
 
More of Tom of England’s erotica, after the jump…
 

Miyagawa Chōshun (1683-1753) - scenes from ‘A Rare and Important Nanshoku Shunga Handscroll.’
 
Not all Japanese art is cherry blossoms, surging waves, and exotic birds, there is a whole world of shunga or erotica filed away among Japan’s beautiful canvases, silks, and scrolls kept by museums and in private collections.

Shunga’s popularity really started during the Edo Period 1603-1868 when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate. This rise in popularity stemmed largely from the dominant male population which had massively increased as a result of the high number of samurai/retainers required to guard provincial lords and their estates and maintain law and order, and through the surge in agricultural laborers required to produce the food to feed this large population. To get an idea of what we’re talking about, the city of Edo—the former name for Tokyo—had a population of one million by 1721. This made Edo the largest city on the planet. But what’s more staggering is that seventy percent (70%) of the city’s population were male. This meant a lot of horny blokes looking for good wank material.

Apparently, the word shunga means “pictures of spring”—spring being a euphemism for erotica probably as in the English equivalent “the joys of spring.” (If you can’t figure that out, I’m not going to explain it for you.) Though shunga was predominantly used by men, it was very popular with the ladies, too. It was also considered very lucky or at least a bringer of good fortune to those who carried a shunga scroll on their person.

When it came to sex, the Japanese have always been far more liberated than most other countries. Indeed, homosexuality and lesbianism have a long history in Japan going way back to ancient times—long before people started documenting such pleasures. In fact, gay sex was AOK in Japan up until 1872 when sodomy was briefly outlawed. This was quickly repealed in 1880. However, as of 2000, sexual orientation is not protected by national civil rights laws which means the LGBT community do not have any recourse to legal protection against discriminations—so much for progress… I guess it’s a mixed bag there.

While most shunga is heterosexually oriented, there is a wealth of gay shunga featuring samurais and old Buddhist masters indulging in sex with young males—often dressed as geishas. These illustrations were called nanshoku or “male colors” a term used to describe the man-on-man action which depicted (usually) idealized pin-ups from the worlds of ancient myth, the military, religion, theater, class, and last but not least, prostitution.
 

Miyagawa Chōshun - scenes from ‘A Rare and Important Nanshoku Shunga Handscroll.’
 

Miyagawa Chōshun.
 
More gay Japanese erotica, after the jump…
 

An erotic painting by Japanese artist, Yuji Moriguchi.
 
“Tentacle erotica” has been a theme present in Japanese pornography and erotica at least since the early 1800s. The trend is still common in Japanese manga where your eyes are often treated to illustrated interpretations of what it’s like for an octopus to force itself sexually on an unwilling female. Tokyo-based artist Yuji Moriguchi brings together both the ancient art of “Shunga” (Japanese erotic art) and modern Manga to create his explicit paintings that feature acts of hardcore sex, bestiality, bondage and other (mostly) fantasy-based scenarios.

If you are a fan of Japanese erotica and are perhaps unfamiliar with Moriguchi then you can thank me later for the images of tentacled creatures having way more fun on a Saturday night than you’ll probably ever have. His use of color is masterful and is alligned with color schemes derived from classic Shunga that he incorporates into his more modern interpretations. Tentacle erotica and tentacle-related pornography is a popular genre of Japanese kink that has proliferated into some pretty fucked up “sinema” that, if you are not already acquainted with, then you should probably just leave it that way because it’s not the kind of thing that you can unsee. Trust me on this one. Unless of course, after looking at Moriguchi’s perplexing porn paintings below you feel the need to see the live-action versions of them, then have at it. But don’t say I didn’t warn you. If collecting this flavor of art is your thing then I recommend picking up the 2014 book from PIE International Japanese Erotica in Contemporary Art. The 320-page book features artwork by Moriguchi and many of his peers such as Takato Yamamoto and Suehiro Maruo. The images that follow are NSFW.
 

 

 

 
More octopussy and more, after the jump…

 
Chéri Hérouard (1881-1961) was an artist best known for his illustrative work for French magazines like the Catholic girls’ journal La Semaine de Suzette and the gentlemen’s’ weekly La Vie Parisienne for which he supplied the cover art for over forty years. His eye-catching illustrations were highly popular and reflected the noteworthy changes in art from Art Nouveau through Art Deco to pioneering the more modern graphic art/comic book style of the 1940s and 1950s. La Vie Parisienne was the magazine best associated with Hérouard’s artwork. This society weekly featured risque erotica alongside stories and features on art, theater, film, literature, and fashion. It was kind of like Esquire magazine or a classier Playboy without the naked flesh.

Hérouard was born Chéri-Louis-Marie-Aime Haumé into a reasonably well-to-do family that lived in the fortified city of Rocroi in the Ardennes district of France. His father died from a freak riding accident just days before his birth. His mother remarried into the Hérouard family—from whom Chéri took his surname. His mother and stepfather thought Chéri was best suited for a career in the military—but their son had a very different idea of what he should be. Hérouard wanted to be an artist. He submitted a portfolio of his work on spec to the magazine Le Journal de la Jeunesse. The editor was so impressed by Hérouard’s draughtsmanship, he bought a selection of drawings for publication in 1902. Like most of his work, these drawings mixed fantasy and fetishism—women as fairies or nymphs, or later, movie stars (like Louise Brooks, above) as desirable fantasies. His distinctive style led Chéri to be soon hired as one of the main artists supplying work for La Vie Parisienne which he joined in 1907.

Providing the covers for a hugely popular magazine was enough to ensure Chéri Hérouard’s reputation as an artist. But he also had a secret life as an illustrator of erotica under the pseudonym “Herric.” As Herric, Chéri illustrated several erotic books, most notably the novel Les Liaisons dangereuses, the Kama Sutra, and a series of “spanking novels” like Leurs pantalons (1927) by Jacques Mauvain, Matée par le fouet (1930) by Jean Martinet, Cinglants châtiments (1932) by Walter Flog, Pantalons sans défense (1938) by Jean Claqueret, and L’écrin du rubis (1939) by Liane Delorys. What we learn from such erotica is that the so-called “sexual revolution” didn’t really start in the swinging sixties—there was always a thriving world of sex and sexual experimentation enjoyed by both men and women long before the advent of Playboy, porn, and the contraceptive pill. This secret history is evinced through the diverse artwork of dozens if not hundreds of artists like Hérouard, Suzanne Ballivet, Bernard Montorgueil, and Luc Lafnet, among many others. These artists (many anonymous) produced erotic illustrations from the 18th-century on, and their work documented the growth of interest in fetishism, S&M, role-play, and gender fluidity long before it was deemed fashionable.
 

 

 
More of Herric’s spanking illustrations, after the jump…

 
Art is mostly about the artist’s personal obsessions, isn’t it? With Japanese artist Namio Harukawa, it’s kinda obvious what he’s obsessed with.

Harukawa draws big-assed dominant women sitting on the faces of skinny subservient men. His drawings depict ye ancient art of “facesitting”—which probably doesn’t need any more explaining than that. Some of his erotic drawings (not included here) go beyond the smothering power games of facesitting, and its associated acts of cunnilingus and anilingus, into coprophilia and urolagnia.

His large, voluptuous women are amazonian, Robert Crumbesque goddesses. They are aloof, indifferent to the plight of the men (quite literally) beneath them. They smoke cigarettes, drink wine, talk on the phone, or read books. These women are utterly in control. The men only exist to service their needs. The men are weak, puny, almost asexual, but willing submit to their mistresses’ needs.

For an artist who produces such powerful and subversive art, it’s rather surprising to find there is only a small amount of biographical detail about him on the Internet. Some pages claim he is dead. Some that he is still alive. There is even a dispute over his age. One Wikipedia entry has him born in 1932, while another Wikipedia page claims he was born in January 1947, in the Osaka Prefecture. Whatever the facts about this elusive and mysterious artist, his work has grown from underground cult status in the 1960s to a small but reverential international market.
 

 

 
More of Namio’s artwork, after the jump…

A rather tame example of the work of Japanese artist Suehiro Maruo.
 
Japanese artist Suehiro Maruo has been an active member of the art community in Japan since he was a high school student. At the young age of fifteen, he left school and moved from Nagasaki to Tokyo where he found work as a bookbinder. He would later attempt to get his artwork published in the hugely popular weekly manga magazine Shōnen Jump but was rejected because his work was considered too graphic. Unfettered, Maruo would follow his instincts and in 1980 would finally get a break with another popular manga magazine, Ribon no Kishi which embraced the artist’s violent and often sexually charged vision. This relationship would open many doors for Maruo including a long-term partnership with celebrated alternative monthly manga, Garo. Maruo’s illustrations and paintings have had a deep impact on the world and his work has been translated into many languages from English to Russian. Though I’m a huge fan myself, it’s safe to say that Maruo’s work appeals to a fairly specific audience as the title of this post quite plainly suggests.

Maruo’s style falls under a couple of classifications in the world of Japanese art;  “Muzan-e” that when translated means “Bloody Prints” which is the traditional Japanese art of carving gruesome images onto wood blocks as originally conceived during the Edo period. Another category that applies to Maruo’s work is the term “ero guro” or “erotic grotesque” which should be self-explanatory. I dug through Maruo’s Tumblr (which is quite addicting) and came across some screen shots of an interview he did where he was discussing what drives him to create, noting that he was actually quite “sensitive” but that his sensitivity wasn’t “unshakable.”

“I tend to create expressions that get stronger and stronger and more grotesque. It’s actually just one of my fantasies. Pleasure and pain are subjects I’m particularly interested in.”

Maruo has a rather strong worldwide cult following—connoisseurs of his special brand of diabolical, blood-soaked Japanese erotica are everywhere and his work has been compiled in books, as well as other various publications such as graphic novels and comics. Maruo also makes an appearance in the documentary film Sex in the Comix along with two other influential illustrators you may have heard of, Robert Crumb and German artist Ralf König. If you’re a fan of the band Naked City—the spasmodically awesome ensemble featuring John Zorn and the talented Bill Frisell—then you may already have some of Maruo’s artwork in your record collection as his work is featured on a few of the band’s releases from the 1990s. Included below are images from Maruo’s collaboration with Naked City as well as selections from his catalog which are completely NSFW.
 

 

 
Much more Maruo after the jump…

 
I suppose it was just another ordinary evening over at Bernard Montorgueil’s apartment. In the front room, there was gathered the usual array of flagellants, sadists, masochists, onanists, fellators, fellatrix, cunning linguists, sodomites and tethered cross-dressers. Each, in their own way, happily enjoying a quiet evening of sex and torture. Most of the men almost naked apart from their stockings and six-inch heels and the glitter of their nipple clamps and cock rings. The women, more sensibly, wore beautiful evening gowns, dress coats or fine tweed skirts and jackets matched by a stout pair of brogues.

It was just as Msr. Montorgueil had imagined it. For he had imagined it all and set it down on paper with a pencil. For this was what Msr. Montorgueil did most days and evenings sitting at his desk—draw pictures of men and women enjoying the carnal delights of S&M.

No one knows the true identity of Bernard Montorgueil. He was so mysterious a figure that “Montorgueil” does not merit even a full entry in Wikipedia. What little is known is that he (or she) was a French artist who produced the bulk of their erotic writing and artwork during the 1920s and 1930s. The work mainly focussed on the world of femdom-malesub with a dash or two of homoerotica and some forced feminization. Montorgueil’s work became very popular in the 1950s, where it was circulated around the underground fetish BDSM community. The drawings were originally produced in pencil and later colored for publication in the 1970s when they were collated into the volumes Dans La Maison des Amazones, Madame de Varennes and Barbara, and Les Quatre Jeudis. These books are long out of print though can be found on eBay. More recently, an edition Dressage was published.
 

 

 
More of the mysterious Bernard Montorgueil’s erotica, after the work…

“Falling Stars” (1897).
 
Sometime in the mid-1870s, while living in Paris, the Hungarian artist Mihály Zichy produced a series of erotic illustrations. These pictures featured men and women having a right old time fucking and wanking, sucking and licking. What inspired Zichy is unclear. A mid-life crisis? A raging hard-on? The current fashion for erotic illustration? Or perhaps wealthy patrons looking for some “dirty pictures”?

Most of these ink drawings lay undiscovered until after Zichy’s death in 1906. They were then collated together and a selection published in a book entitled Liebe (aka Oh, Liebe) in 1911. This nicely produced volume caused a bit of a stir. Zichy might have been pleased—he had often caused controversy with his work. His most famous picture was the demonically-charged anti-war painting “The Triumph of the Genius of Destruction” (1878). This painting was banned by the militaristic French authorities as deviant propaganda. He also managed to offend many Catholics with his work “Autodafé” (1868), which depicted the horrors of Spanish Inquisition. That said, Zichy was a very respectable artist. He painted the portrait of Lajos Batthyány, the first Hungarian Prime Minister. He was commissioned to produce paintings of the Empress of Austra, “Queen Elisabeth Laying Flowers by the Coffin of Ferenc Deák” and “Drinking Bout of Henry III.” He also supplied 27 illustrations for the poem The Knight in the Panther’s Skin in 1881.

Zichy was born in Zala, Hungary on October 15, 1827. He started out studying law before taking up a career as an artist. He traveled to Vienna where he became a pupil of the painter Ferdinand Georg Waldmüller. Under Waldmüller’s recommendation, he became a teacher. He then became a court artist for the Russian Tsar Alexander II. When he left St. Petersburg, he traveled around Europe before settling in Paris circa 1874.

Another intriguing question about Zichy’s erotic illustrations is whether he worked from life models? The drawings look more than just the work of some fevered imagination—most noticebly by the fact Zichy’s couples appear to be enjoying each other as equals and not portrayed as mere titillation for the male gaze. He also depicted gay sex and masturbation—which would have been shocking at the time. His style of drawing, the clear lines, the soft penciling, would influence succeeding artists producing similar erotic illustrations.
 

“The Triumph of the Genius of Destruction” (1878).
 

“Autodafé” (1868).
 
See more of Zichy’s erotic artwork, after the jump…

A surrealist-style painting by German artist, Rudolf Schlichter.
 
At the age of 26, while he had been pursuing his studies at the Art Academy of Kunstakademie in Karlsruhe, German artist Rudolf Schlichter was drafted into the army. Following a successful hunger strike, Schlichter was dismissed from his duties and returned to the bustling, forward-thinking town of Karlsruhe. Schlichter didn’t stick around for long and soon set off for Berlin where he fell in with the Dada scene and became a communist.

Schlichter made a successful living in Berlin from his illustrations. He transitioned from Dada to the “Neue Saclichkeit” movement (or “New Objectivity”) that used realism to express skepticism related to current events. He quickly became one of the most influential and critically important contributors to this quasi-Expressionism. Within New Objectivity there were two additional artistic courses: The “Verists” were known for using portraiture as a vehicle for their hostility toward authority figures, affluence and the oppression of society. The works of the great Otto Dix played a large role in this sub-component of New Objectivity. The other was commonly referred to as “Magic Realists” who were in opposition to the German style of Expressionism. Probably the most notable Magic Realism artist was Georg Schrimpf whose work was a crucial part of New Objectivity. Now that we’ve got your mini subversive art lesson out of the way, here’s a bit more on Rudolf Schlichter whose work, though not initially, was reviled by the Nazis.

While Schlichter’s body of work is as vast as it is diverse, there were many recurrent points of interest and themes, especially erotic ones, in his paintings and illustrations. Often his subjects were comprised of various bohemian movers and shakers and other residents who were part of the vibrant counterculture of the streets of Berlin where he spent much of his time. In 1923 Schlichter provided 60 illustrations for an edition of Oscar Wilde’s The Ballad of Reading Gaol. At the end of the 1920s, Schlichter returned to being a practicing Catholic and would end up doing illustrations for various religious publications put out by the church including a youth-oriented magazine called Jungle Front. The illustrations in the magazine often cast a disparaging light on the politics of Adolf Hitler. Coincidently at the time of its publication, Schlichter also belonged to the exclusively German art organization run by the Third Reich, “Reichskammer der bildenden Künste” or the “Reich Chamber of Fine Arts” headed up by propagandist extraordinaire Joseph Goebbels. And as you might imagine the jab didn’t go unnoticed and Schlichter was promptly ousted. His work was removed from galleries and destroyed and Schlichter’s name was added to the “degenerate art” list kept by the Nazis. Which in my mind is always the right kind of list to be on, in any time period.

Though he would pass away at the age of 65, a little more than a decade prior to his death Schlichter produced many remarkable pieces of surrealistic style paintings. Which would lead to the artist being dubbed “the German Salvador Dali.” I’ve included a few of Schlichter’s surrealist works as well as a nice sampling of his erotica below. Which means much of what follows is NSFW.
 

 

“Blonde Enemy” 1922.
 

“Dada Roof Studio.”
 
More after the jump…

Gerda and Einer Wegener posing in front of one of Gerda’s paintings, 1925.
 
After moving to Paris from Copenhagen in the early 1900s, the work of then 26-year-old Gerda Wegener garnered the attention of the liberal and experimental art scene thriving in the adventurous city. Though she was already a successful artist in her former hometown well known for her lush illustrations for fashion magazines, a nearly unprecedented event involving her husband Einer would send the pair off to Paris with the hope that their unconventional partnership would be better accepted in the more permissive city.

If Wegener’s name is familiar to you, it is most likely because the extraordinary lives of the groundbreaking artist and her husband were the subjects of the 2015 film, The Danish Girl which was based on a fictional novel from 2000 of the same name by David Ebershoff. If you’ve not read the book or seen the film, the Wegeners’ story is an incredibly compelling tale of love, acceptance, bravery and of course sex. As I don’t want to provide every detail of their extraordinary tale as not to spoil it for anyone, I’ll share a few points of interest as they pertain to Gerda’s spellbinding erotica.

According to historians, Einer’s interest in exploring his true sexuality began after a model failed to show for a sitting with his wife. After she jovially mused that Einer should put on a pair of thigh-highs and heels so she could still paint, he agreed. Unbeknownst to fans of her work, the image of a mysterious dark-haired beauty who would be a reccurring subject in her paintings was actually Einer who had become the primary focus and muse for his wife.

In 1930 after living much of his life as “Lili,” at the age of 47 Einer would travel to Germany to forever transition to a woman and would be one of the first men to go through gender-reassignment surgery. Wegener’s erotic, lesbian-themed paintings caused quite a stir—including the occasional public riot due to their graphic nature. Her less controversial works would grace the pages of Vogue for years as well as other fashion publications.

I’ve included an array of images from Wegener’s vast catalog of erotic works below which, as you might have guessed, are beguilingly NSFW.
 

1926.
 

1925.
 
More after the jump…

“Fainting.”
 
Volumes of vintage erotica are wasted on academics. Just think how many beautiful books filled with lusty, erotic engravings are moldering away under lock and key in some dark, dusty archive. They’re not for our eyes of course but rather for those of a disinterested professor or an ambitious Ph.D. student looking to reinterpret ancient sex manuals from a post-feminist, non-binary, neo-hermetic viewpoint.

Knowledge is power. Having access to knowledge makes us powerful. In the same way, memory can help define who we are, ye olde books can help us understand who we were. That’s probably why I sometimes begrudge all those wonderful books being kept from our grubby little paws—though in truth admit we must have our gatekeepers.

However, thankfully, there are those good people at the Wellcome Library who understand knowledge of the past helps us navigate the present. The Wellcome Library is one of my favorite websites. It is crammed with the most delightful and mind-expanding books, documents and artworks—which these good people have scanned and put online for our edification.

One day browsing through diseases and alike, I chanced upon a fine volume entitled Invocation à l’amour. Chant philosophique published in France in 1825. This is a “rare” and beautiful book containing a long poem celebrating sex and all the various sexual positions. The poem is a literal invocation calling on God the “Father of the human race and of pleasure, Love, come fill me with your divinity. So that from your transports I may render the ecstasies…”

It then goes on to “invoke the nine sisters of Apollo” to ensure everything “follows the supreme law” of well… I guess you’d call it S.E.X. Jane Austen was never like this. But it’s fascinating to find such an early paean to sex and sexuality—which also gives the lie to that hoary old chestnut sex was invented in the swinging sixties by the baby boomers….

It’s a strange and fiery poem which could do with a more nuanced translation than the one offered by Google. But if so inclined, you can read the original text by “A virtuoso of the good fashion” here.

Aside from the sex magick poetry, this slim red-leathered volume has some stunning illustrations. We don’t know who the artist was of these highly explicit engravings but we can at least admire their artistry, imagination and humor.
 

“The happy calculation.”
 

“The charms of masturbation.”
 
More illustrations from ‘Invocation à l’amour,’ after the jump…

An erotic Queen of Clubs playing card featuring the artwork of French painter Paul-Émile Bécat.
 
Here’s a lovely NSFW treat for your eyes today—gorgeous images from a deck of playing cards featuring the erotic art of French painter and printer Paul-Émile Bécat.

This Le Florentin deck of playing cards was put out in 1955 and are in the style of the Old Masters such as his fellow Frenchmen François Boucher and Jean-Antoine Watteau. Bécat’s artistic style so closely emulates an era far earlier than his lifetime it would be quite easy to believe that they were done long before the 1950s. Bécat’s dedication his craft resulted in his work appearing in nearly 100 books, most of which published his erotic paintings and illustrations, some of which have accompanied books by the likes of Charles Baudelaire, Verlaine, and Voltaire. What’s especially interesting about Bécat is the fact that he didn’t actually start working in the erotic arena until much later in his life, his mid-40s. Also of interest is that his playing cards come off as tame when compared with his erotic paintings which feature graphic oral sex and other hedonistic scenes—including one taking place in a prison cell complete with handcuffs and chains.

Though there were likely 12,000 of Bécat’s gorgeous decks that once existed they are hard to come by today. I’ve seen fairly pristine examples listed for nearly $600. If you’re a fan of erotic art and are unfamiliar with Bécat, I’m sure you will dig what you’re about to see. Though his work has sadly not yet been compiled in a comprehensive book, there is an incredible paperback, La Vie des Dames Galantes (The Lives of the Gallant Ladies) published in 1948 that I did find here for the tidy sum of $250 (others in various condition can be found here). The book contains 26 hand-colored illustrations by Bécat including lesbian erotica. And as I’ve just mentioned sapphic erotica, oral sex, handcuffs and chains, it’s probably safe to assume the images that follow are NSFW.
 

The Queen of Clubs from the top of the post rotated to show the opposing illustration.
 

 
More after the jump…

 
Netsuke is type of Japanese miniature sculpture or carving popular around the Edo period, 1615–1868. The word “netsuke” is formed out of the Japanese characters “ne’ and “tsuke” which apparently mean to “root” and “to attach.” Netsuke were originally worn on garments as a means to carry small personal effects—medicine, tobacco, what have you. Over time netsuke changed in use to a decorative and ornamental function.

Netsuke were primarily carved from ivory or bone though wood and whale tooth were also fashionable. The sculptures generally depicted famous people, animals (cute little bunny rabbits were very popular), plants, deities, mythical beasts and sex. These porny carvings were known as shunga netsuke and featured all forms of coitus.

The men in these carvings generally sported humungous dicks and the women always looked rather pleased. But these miniatures were not just novelties—they were considered good luck charms. In Japan a happy sex life had long been associated as a means to safeguard against bad luck. A house with a shunga netsuke over its lintel would be protected from fire. A soldier carrying one would be protected in battle. To own one meant fertility and success. These beautiful and comic little miniatures were considered life-affirming and radiated tolerance and patience. Nowadays this aspect of shunga netsuke is less important as these carvings can sell for several hundred dollars to a thousand plus at auction.
 

 

 
More racy miniatures, after the jump…

 
Mel Brooks was once on Michael Parkinson’s chat show sometime in the early 1980s where he described the opening scenes to his proposed next movie. Brooks explained he wanted his film to begin like Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey—but instead of apes he wanted to show a neanderthal standing upright for the first time. His spiel went something like this—I’m gonna paraphrase so deal with it:

It’s early morning—just before dawn. The sun is slowly igniting the horizon. A band of gold appears as the theme from Thus Sprach Zarathustra begins to play under the picture. As the sun rises a group of neanderthals huddle together fearfully watching this magical giant disc rising up like a god. As the music swells a beam of pure golden light radiates across the landscape.

The neanderthals are scared and cower away form this approaching light—all except one who climbs on all fours towards the top of the mountain. As this inquisitive figure moves forward the sun rises. The sky is now fire bright.

The golden orb continues to rise—the neanderthal reaches out to grasp it. He begins to rise up on two legs. First one then the other arm reach out towards the sky. As the music reaches its dramatic climax—the neanderthal is standing teetering on tiptoe arms raised. The neanderthal looks up at the sun. Then slowly at his arms—at his hands—then down at his feet. He has risen up like the sun and now stands upright for the very first time. This creature has liberated his arms to create, to produce and to help him shape a new world. His fellow neanderthals scurry away in fear. As a new day begins the first homo erectus looks at his hands—mesmerized by his fingers, by their potential to grip and move, to adapt and change. He lowers his arms and looks down at them contemplating his new power and the potential now opened to him. The music finishes as this first proto-human looks down considering the significance of his actions. It’s a powerful moment in human evolution. He looks again at his hands—he’s free to use them to help others—to change the world.

And that’s when he starts masturbating.

Human evolution—the progression towards self-gratification.

Which brings us—in roundabout fashion—to these historic and seemingly erotic images depicting the use of the enema in medicine and sex. What begins as a series of etchings often satirically showing women and men seeking much-needed relief for their “night soil” evolves into more recent imagery where the enema is used primarily for sexual gratification. It is apparent that humanity has an unbridled ingenuity for finding gratification from almost anything—vegetables, furniture, house hold appliances and even medicinal treatments.

The drawings and paintings from the twentieth century were produced by various artists who made small change producing illustrations for various editions of erotica. Some names are aliases—most notably Julie Delcourt who may or may not be the pseudonym for Richard Hegemann—a German artist who also worked under the names A. Hegemann, A. Hegener and P. Rollmann. Hegemann excelled in depicting matronly women thrashing supplicant men and badly behaved boys and girls in sailor suits who seemingly relished the whack of their teacher’s belt. Many of Julie Delcourt’s other paintings (not included here) are decidedly NSFW and rather questionable.

An individual who derives pleasure from receiving enemas is called a klismaphiliac.  The term klismaphilia was only coined fairly recently by Dr. Joanne Denko in 1973—which tends to make it seem as if klismaphiliac is only a modern practice. But as can be seen by these illustrations from the the 18th century and more recently the 1920s and 1930s—klismaphilia has a much longer history.
 

‘A fashionable lady being given an enema by a charming young man’—Dicuelt 18th century.
 

‘A peeping-tom spying on a fashionable lady receiving an enema’—Pierre-Antoine Baudouin.
 
More friends or enemas? after the jump….