Even during his earliest training as an artist, Mapplethorpe sought his own unique expression. During his time as a student at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York, Mapplethorpe built on the cutting-edge approaches of 20th-century icons such as Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns by focusing on mixed media compositions. It was his acquisition of a Polaroid camera in 1970, however, that truly changed his approach completely. At first, he saw photographs as a means to produce what he called “more honest” collages, but soon, as his finesse in the medium progressed, Mapplethorpe pursued photography as his main medium.

Though some of his initial series were commercial commissions, when shooting for himself Mapplethorpe most often focused his lens on the people that surrounded him: friends, fellow artists, and associates from the S&M underground. It was this more covert culture that came to dominate his artistic oeuvre. His aim in his imagery was not to exaggerate the erotic content. On the contrary, he saw his images as chronicling an under-documented aspect of American culture. “I don’t like the word shocking,” Mapplethorpe mentioned in an ARTnews interview in 1988 when discussing his images, “I’m looking for the unexpected.” He showcases this unexpected aspect in the way in which he crops his compositions.

In most frames, we are not given an entire figure but rather just one of its tantalizing tidbits. On the one hand, such cropping can be seen as teasing the viewer, leaving him or her to imagine the remainder of the figure. On the other hand, this cropping creates a visual distance, or disconnect, that encourages the viewer not to idolize the model as a sex object but rather celebrate the sensual landscape of the body one frame at a time.

One of Mapplethorpe’s most striking series of nude female photographs was shot in the early 1980s. With his prominence as a photographer secured, Mapplethorpe used World Women’s Bodybuilding Champion Lisa Lyon as his muse. In this series, Mapplethorpe conjured intimate images that on the one hand played with the provocative, but on the other, celebrating the classical components of form and proportion. The result was a compelling compendium of images that showcased both the beauty of the female form and the artful eye of Mapplethorpe himself.

 

It was shortly after this series that Mapplethorpe’s health began to decline: 1986 brought the revelation that he was suffering from AIDS. He died three years later at the age of 43, and yet his status was already secured as one of the most significant photographers of the 20th century. This status is still secure today, as Mapplethorpe’s images are continuously recognized for their artful beauty.

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Erotic art is often viewed as taboo. But the philosophy of erotica plays an important role in portraying, capturing, and accepting humanity.

While the 20th and 21st century saw an attempted suppression of the philosophy of erotica, it continues to be an important and celebrated artistic style. In all the biggest art galleries around the world, nude art is prominently on display. Of course, it is not without erotic art controversy and its history.

Embracing Human Nature Through Erotic Art

Descartes and Hobbes are proponents in an attempt to suppress erotic art. They believed that erotic desire was subversive and detrimental to the modern age. That our natural longings and lust would distract from advancement.

Art, however, is subversive. It provokes an emotional response triggered by our basest desires. Erotic art, in this way, is perhaps the most honest artistic style – appealing to our natural impulses and selves.

An attempt to suppress these desires is denying who we truly are. Whereas embracing erotic art allows for us to reach a true expression and acceptance of self.

Plato took it a step further. The word “erotica” comes from the Greek word “eros,” meaning love or passion. For Plato, the pursuit of eros was a means of ascension.

He proposed that humanity’s true desire is for immortality. We seek immortality through procreation, a means of continuing the self. In this way, eros transcends human existence. As such, the pursuit of erotic art is not only in harmony with our base nature, but a means of achieving our true desires.

The Fallacy of Immaculate Perception in Art

Immaculate perception is the idea of aesthetics that are completely void of desire. Philosophers like Kant and Schopenhauer deny erotica from art because they elicit an emotional response by invoking lust. This is a fallacy because all art derives a response through provoking desires.

Nietzsche defends the erotic. Art for the sake of aesthetics is a pursuit of beauty. The ultimate result of all beauty is procreation, “from the most sensual to the most spiritual.” Art devoid of desire is art devoid of aesthetics.

Philosopher Richard Shusterman emphasizes that sexual experiences and expressions are themselves aesthetic. As such, erotic art is an undeniable art form. He also found that the philosophy of erotica as important in the study of somaesthetics.

Somaesthetics

Somaesthetics is the study of bodily perception, performance, and presentation. It emphasizes the concept of the body beyond the physical. The incorporation of erotica creates mindfulness of the body’s desires.

Beyond Physical

Erotic art goes beyond physical. It communicates emotions and feelings that invite a response, with or without including nudity. Sensual and sexual pleasures are evoked through erotica and provocative art.

The collection and display of erotica can evoke passion, setting a tone amongst lovers. Or it can provoke an emotive and reflective response. Philosophy of erotica can be empowering, sexual, or romantic, but in all forms, it is a source of honest aesthetic pleasure.

Erotic and nude art have some similar attributes, but they are ultimately two different genres. In this piece, we take a look at how to recognize the difference between them. As an erotic art gallery, we often see confusion between these two artistic genres. This piece will help to see how they differ.

Defining Nude Art

Nude art is any fine artwork that depicts the naked human body as its primary subject. It has been a longstanding genre across many forms of media throughout the ages. From the nude statues of the Ancient Greeks, to Renaissance painters like Sandro Botticelli, to modern nude photographers like Ben Ernst.

The human form has been a central theme in art since inception, and nudity the most honest depiction and expression of it.

Defining Erotic Art

Erotic art is fine artwork that is intended to arouse the viewer, and/or depicts sexual activity. Both erotic themes and artistic merit define this genre. Erotic art could be appreciated as fine art even void of arousal. This separates it from pornography or obscenity.

Although erotic and nude art is generally separate genres, there are similarities between the two. These grey areas are largely responsible for common misidentification between the genres.

The Grey Areas

In the public eye, these two genres are too often seen as one and the same. One of the big causes of this is the use of nudity itself. But, nudity alone does not constitute erotica. Erotic nude art is a popular subgenre that may further the confusion, as it falls directly into both categories.

All nude art depicts nudity. Erotic art depicts eroticism, with or without nudity. Just because artwork shows the naked body, does not automatically qualify it as erotic art.

There are many themes and fetishes in erotic art that do not involve nudity. Fetish apparel, for instance, ascribes sexuality to wearing certain clothes. Pin-up photography is a popular category of erotica that, more often than not, does not contain nudity. Artists frequently depict eroticism without nudity.

Other categories of erotic art, such as bondage photography, contain nudity although it is not the primary erotic driver. Instead, that comes from factors like the exchange of power, intimacy, and mastery of the skill.

Another factor that frequently draws a parallel between the two genres is censorship. Both erotic and nude art have fallen victim to censorship. In theory, censorship is intended to protect the public from offensive or harmful material. Instead, it too often sees use as a means of suppressing artistic creation.

Neither nudity nor erotica necessarily falls under the vein of “offensive” or “harmful” so long as they constitute fine art. The arguments for and against the censorship of both genres are similar enough that they are easily painted with the same brush.

Key Differences Between Erotic & Nude Art

The two key differences between erotic and nude art are the intent and the effect. Although both genres are fine art, they serve separate purposes.

Erotic art has the specific intention of causing arousal in the viewer. The intent is how many artists categorize the piece as belonging to one genre or the other. Nude art is not made with this intention, even though it can cause arousal in viewers. The difference is whether eroticism is clearly the purpose.

For example, consider a popular bit among comedians discussing the Sears catalog. They tell stories of being aroused by Sears models during their youth, tearing out pages, or hoarding catalogs. Of course, the intention of the Sears catalog was not to evoke arousal. So even though arousal may have occurred to a minority of viewers, it did not constitute erotic art.

Having said that, the effect can determine a piece like an erotic nude, rather than a nude. Regardless of the artist’s intent, if the majority of viewers find the piece evokes erotic arousal, it may fall under the category of erotica. The difference between this and the Sears example is that the people perceiving the art as erotic in the example are outliers rather than a general consensus.

The effect can work the opposite way as well. For example, an erotic photographer may have prints of a nude model intended for viewers with a foot fetish. For those without a foot fetish, they can appreciate the artistic value of the piece, but the erotic appeal may be lost on them. Outside of this particular fetish community, this piece may be deemed nude art rather than erotic.

Does Individual Perception Matter?

From a broad categorization sense, the difference between nudity and erotica isn’t based on the individual viewer. But, from a more personal standpoint, individual perception matters more. The owner of erotic artwork may choose to purchase and/or display an art print because of their personal connection with it.

When buying art, the most important aspect is finding a piece that appeals to your tastes, sensibilities, and desires. For more tips for buyers view our Guide to Shopping for Limited Edition Art. Or, browse our gallery of nude and erotic art from both established and up-and-coming artists.

Art Provocateur is the premier online gallery of erotic art prints.  Browse our galleries of limited edition and one-of-a-kind artwork. We have the largest selection of erotic and nude art from both established artists and rising stars.

Erotica is a term applied not only to literature and art, but media, objects, costume and performances that arouse, titillate and excite.

Examples of erotica span from what some might consider purely pornography, to the literary delights of the ancient Roman poet Ovid and Shakespeare such as Venus and Adonis. The assessment of what constitutes erotica varies and fluctuates culture-to-culture, era-to-era.

In post enlightenment European culture, erotic art that provokes sexual feelings is often belied as too distracting because it does not sublimate ideas, but rather evokes feeling that some see as self-interested or out of control. One might wonder if this is more a problem of the critic than the audience of erotica in general.

People continue to collect and enjoy erotica despite censure.

Art is not always about intellectual deconstruction, for centuries it has been used to illicit feeling, of religious devotion, of horror and moral outrage, of national pride, of cautionary moral tales and for so long as intimate devices for sexual stimulation. Ironically, people continued to collect and enjoy erotic art despite censure, and artists continued to create and construct such works.

Provocative Art: It is amusing to note that dictionaries of the English language often include the definition of provocative as a drive to annoy or irritate.

Consider that those artists who dare to make provocative art and refuse to adhere to aesthetic standards regarding “obscenity” may do so not only out of pure obstinacy but also rather of very personal aesthetic vision and a certain amount of courage.

While some might see provocation as an ugliness, it can also be sublimely beautiful. Suppose it depends on one’s definition of sex and sexuality.

Think about the famously popular late nineteenth-early twentieth century French sculptor August Rodin, who has long been considered the first modern sculptor. This seminal artist defied common models of finished polished depictions of nudity. Using the device of stone carving emerging from raw stone, Rodin created explicit and provocative visions of sexuality that defied not only cultural expectations, but created an illusory world of the artist’s studio. Ultimately, we can connect this to the “modern” vision of artistic primacy.

Rodin’s sculpture provokes, and is the paradigm for sensuality, provocation, and the power of representational art to inflame, to provoke imagination. And yet, within this aesthetic we see, not only the physical act of two lovers intertwined, straining soft marble curves contrasting with the unfinished edges of stone, arching muscular torso, we see another kind of power, of physicality, that of the artist, masterly carving from stone, provoking admiration, a sense of the power of virility and art.

The influence of Rodin is seen in much of modernist sculpture including Aristide Maillol, Henry Moore, and Henri Matisse. Rodin’s way of working is also seen in the sensual depiction of the erotic human body in photography and drawing particularly gesture, line, texture, and form.

Maybe today it’s easy to succeed in the art of erotica, if by that for an artist, is meant to make an exhibition and find their name in the newspaper. But what really separates some artists from all others is the ability to be noticeable without being aware that they have achieved this level of recognition. Despite numerous painters, who are lovers of paintbrushes and tempera, there are artists who have driven their passion for digital and photography. One of them, the rarest among all, is Jan Saudek, a renowned Czech photographer.

“There are too many imitators – I do not want to show the way to anyone anymore.” – Jan Saudek

Born in Prague in 1935, several years just before World War II, Saudek is forced to face the consequences that will follow only because of his origins. His father was Jewish and many of his relatives ended their lives in a concentration camp. Jan and his brother were also deported to the camp, separated from their father, who shared the same fate with their sons. All of them survive this period. Stuck between memories of murdered children, the sound of shots, a person’s last breaths and his dreams, Jan begins to explore the possibilities and the magic of photography. In 1950 he got his first camera, Kodak Baby Brownie. This was the beginning of the art war lead by Jan against the political system, his family and his lustful dreams.

To understand his erotic art, you need to glance into the deepest and darkest parts of his being. He is like a house with many floors and windows, each one offering a different view. Jan Saudek is the second child in the family, and as he said, “he is predestined to spend all his life as No. 2.” Saudek yearned for physical love since his young years. He lost his virginity at 15, with a girl who was also a virgin. His life is filled with failed relationships, passionate relationships, ruined marriages and separation from his children. Saudek, like any conscious artist, has managed in his own way to fight against the military and the communist regime. Often, he had no opportunity to express his views through his works because they were banned. Traveling to the USA was the first step that led Jan to succeed. He explored all forms of art but mostly focused on his unique life companion: photography.

Jan Saudek has the courage that many of us dream of.

Life experiences, passions, and interests are transferred to the works of Jan Saudek. He creates paintings and photos that speak of: the beauty of life, childhood, dreams, desires and unfulfilled plans, human nature, body and nudity, love and hate, sexuality and sexual attraction, passion, sadism and masochism, domination, melancholy, depression and doubts, life and death, fantasies hidden in the human mind. The works of this extraordinary artist could be the new art genre that has not been named yet.

Eroticism in the works of this Czech genius is shown through the human body and nudity. Jan Saudek has the courage that many of us dream of. Through his photographs, he depicts the female body the way it is, no uniformity, no stereotypes or rules. The female body is presented as a figure of femininity. Sex, penetration, defloration and making love are not taboo for Jan Saudek. Rather, he revives these moments by putting emphasis on the most intimate parts of the human imagination. What other people were seeing as prohibited, incompatible and kitsch – Jan Saudek has used it as the foundation of his art. In the late seventies, his black and white images gain a new dimension; Saudek began to use techniques, which included color, tinting and hand painting.  Using bold colors, Saudek reaches a climax in displaying his individuality. His works not only depict nudity; they themselves are nudity. They are honest, open, without fear or embarrassment to show what lies in the mind and soul of an artist or a simple man. Many of the models in the pictures were his wives, girlfriends, lovers, and children.

The representation of women and the female body is easily noticeable in Saudek’s photographs. He exalts the naked body of a woman in a sophisticated, erotic way. Often it can be aggressive, even grotesque. The female sex organ, its utilization or purity is shown with unprecedented passion. Some of his photos show details of masochism and sadism, sexual domination of masculinity that owns the female body – all this without the intention to harm the woman. Rather, he loves all women beings through his sincere art. The male body is also represented. It is solid, tight and good-looking. The man in the work of Saudek adores the woman; he is experiencing sexual delirium, he enters into an unknown world of sexual fantasy and lust.

Another detail that must not be missed is the vacant room (chambre libre) that Jan uses when making portraits and expressions of his dreams, capturing the moment of imaginativeness. The room is empty; there is no furniture, only details, and a model. Often, the room would have cloudy walls that take one’s mind to the farthest dreams using colorful carpet, skulls, cradles, sex toys, artworks, mirrors, and props.

Saudek gives you a peek into his genius mind, and from his life experience brings us controversial beauty through erotica.

Art Provocateur is the premier online gallery of erotic art prints. Browse our erotic art gallery for limited edition and one-of-a-kind artwork. We have the largest selection of erotic and nude art from both established artists and rising stars.

The gift of erotica has a long history, and such items have been considered symbols of beauty, pleasure, and admiration. The word erotica has so many connotations and often evokes images of explicit content, and yet, it can take so many other forms: small ceramics, murals depicting the secrets of ancient cults, 18th-century allegorical pictures, etching, paintings, contemporary photos and so much more.

To understand that there exists an entire world of erotic poetry, novels, and images that without being explicit are definitively erotic and provocative, we only need to turn to literature or art for example. In terms of relatively modern times, one merely has to think of classic books like D.H. Lawrence’s novel Lady Chatterley’s Lover, or 18th-century French painter Jean Honoré Fragonard’s sublimated depictions of garden dalliances like The Lover Crowned, a picture commissioned for the French King Louis XV, by his famous mistress Madame du Barry.

And so this brings us to the fact that one particularly fascinating part of this history is its connection to gift-giving. In Western culture, erotica was a favored tribute for one’s lover, courtesan, mistress, or partner in many historic periods. Poems were written for lovers, allegorical sculptures made, paintings dedicated to a mistress or wife. Collections were acquired.

This tradition stems from ancient times, and in the Greco-Roman period included totems, amulets, decorative objects, mosaics, sculpture, vase painting, murals, and manuscripts. Even though it exists in fragments, we can still see glimpses of erotic acts in this ancient manuscript. Once called the first men’s magazine, The Turin Papyrus is a treasured example of the ancient taste for the erotic.

It was a favorite practice to give one’s lover an art object, such as pottery decorated with scenes of provocation and sexual acts. Whether gifts or articles of amusement or mythic symbolism, ancient people commonly owned phallic talisman and apotropaic sculpture signifying fertility and fecundity in fields, a motif that has not lost its power to amuse and excite. In fact, in Roman culture, the fertility god Priapus was very popular, and we know of artful examples of provocative amulets such as phallic images found in Pompeii, even seen in lamps, mosaics, architectural decoration, and tombstones.

How did this tradition and sensibility carry through time? There was a certain uninhibited celebration of pleasure in ancient erotica, wall paintings in homes and ceramics reveal explicit scenes of people coupling in various combinations, the strength of which seems to have sustained its appeal and presence. In the 18^th and 19^th century excavations uncovered previously unknown examples to the great delight of many.

Erotic and provocative art has always been a form of currency with a value of pleasure.

And of course, its exceptionally interesting nature may have allowed ancient erotica to be preserved and collected. After all, sexuality is always appealing. Yet, we should be mindful that giving erotica was more than a suggestive or lewd overture. Erotic excitement was endowed with a sacred character largely because of its association with the cult of Dionysus, god of fertility as well as pleasure. Examples of this celebration of erotica are seen in the great pictures of sex acts in the Villa of Mysteries, c. 60 BC, including the picture of a female initiate being whipped by a priestess.

While of course there was diversity among the eras and regions of the ancient Greco-Roman world, not to mention individuals who produced or purchased the artwork, much of the cultural attitudes during this period are distinguished by attitudes towards sexuality and the artistic expression of sex as positive if not sacred, and so the gift of erotica had the most complimentary of associations. The formal attributes of ancient erotica are seen in modern artwork as well.

Today, we might consider that as part of this legacy, contemporary artists who make erotic art hold an equally holistic and sumptuous attitude to sex, sexuality, and themes of desire. This aesthetic and outlook build on a legacy of complex and historical depictions of desire.

Collecting erotica, erotic art, and provocative art has always been not only popular, but a currency, not to mention the absolutely delightful value of pleasure and titillation, and is truly, the greatest of compliments.

Always one to make waves with his art, Picasso made one of the biggest splashes of his career in 1916, with the debut of a large, provocative canvas at a leading modern art exhibition. His colleagues and critics celebrated the painting as the dawn of Cubism, an innovative painting approach that secured Picasso’s position in the pantheon of artistic greats. While it heralded a new era in artistic ingenuity, it was more importantly also an erotically charged work. Known today as Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907, Museum of Modern Art), this composition depicted a brothel scene filled with nudes.

Picasso invoked erotic themes throughout his career, from tasteful nude studies to more sexually explicit vignettes. During the early years of the twentieth century, the erotic played a particularly significant role in Picasso’s exploration of himself. This exploration of eroticism as a means of self-reflection opened new doors for artistic innovation. It gave new intensity to images with sexual implications and revealed their potential to be powerful reflections of one’s own experiences. So, while Picasso is firmly established as a founder of modernity, he can also be credited with creating a new place for eroticism in twentieth-century art.

At the turn of the century, Picasso, barely in his twenties, began experimenting with different approaches to painting. The first half of the first decade of the twentieth century was dominated with his experimentation with color through his Blue Period (1901-1904) and Rose Period (1904-1906). It is during these years that one can sense the initial impact of the erotic in Picasso’s paintings. In 1903, for example, he completed a small oil painting entitled La Douceur (1903; Metropolitan Museum of Art), a boudoir picture that is rendered in the cool blues typical of his Blue Period. It is also a rather suggestive image, both in that Picasso painted a particular sexual act being performed and also that he used his own self-portrait to depict the recipient of this sexual favor. He positions himself as somewhat detached from the act that is occurring, instead of propping himself up and gazing rather confidently at the viewer. While this posture can be seen as Picasso’s quotation of his art-historical heritage (The Metropolitan, for example, draws parallels between this pose and that seen in some compositions by Francisco Goya, one of Picasso’s idols), it also suggests a certain level of bravura and biography on the part of the artist, as he was a rather wanton youth.

Picasso’s shift toward experimentation with composition and form in late 1906 and early 1907 resulted in the development of Cubism, an artistic approach that generally involved the breakdown of figural and material forms into geometric planes or facets of color. Even while undergoing these more technical innovations, Picasso continued to incorporate erotic references. Indeed, some of these earliest Cubist explorations focus on compositions of women with amorous or erotic connections. Les Demoiselles d’Avignon is a prime example, as it reveals five prostitutes supposedly staged in a brothel interior. Their naked bodies are rendered as facets, or planes of color, while their faces dissolve into a certain level of asymmetry or disfigurement. This is most pronounced in the two right-hand figures, whose faces were reworked into emulations of African masks. The grittiness of this masked figure in the foreground is exacerbated by her rather vulgar squatting position as she looks directly out at the viewer.

The erotic played a significant role in Picasso’s exploration of himself.

While Picasso could be examining his own profligate sexuality here, one can also say that this painting reflects Picasso’s own tumultuous relationship with model-turned-lover Fernand Olivier. The two had met and fell in love in 1904, but their liaison was plagued with jealously that resulted in consistent bickering and, eventually, their separation. Picasso’s love for Fernand, and perhaps also his desire to better understand her, is reflected pronouncedly in his early Cubist works, and it seems not coincidental that it was when Picasso and Fernand parted ways in 1907 that he returned to Demoiselles d’Avignon and changed the two women on the right into masked figures. While only Picasso knows exactly why he incorporated these changes, one can suggest that he did so in direct response to Fernand’s departure. Thus, the eroticism of the scene is tempered with Picasso’s personal frustration between sex, love, and life.

For more discussion of Picasso’s erotic art, please look to Picasso Érotique, the comprehensive catalog from the 2001 exhibition organized by the French Réunion des Musées Nationaux that featured over 350 works on an erotic theme from Picasso’s oeuvre.