American erotica
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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North American erotica is erotica from the USA and Canada. It is closely linked to its censorship of obscenity history.
Contents |
19th century
- Anthony Comstock and the September Morn case, Thomas Eakins, Eadweard Muybridge perhaps sought prurience next to scientific inquiry
- 1601 (1880) - Mark Twain
Publishers:
20th century
People
- Alfred Cheney Johnston (1885 – 1971), photographer known for his portraits of Ziegfeld Follies showgirls.
- Samuel Roth, (1893–1974), American publisher and writer. He was the plaintiff in Roth v. United States (1957), which was a key Supreme Court ruling on the censorship of obscenity in the United States.
- Irving Klaw, (1910 - 1966), American photographer and filmmaker, best-known for operating a mail-order business selling photographs and film of Bettie Page (often in bondage) from the 1940s to the 1960s
- Marilyn Monroe, (1926 – 1962), American actress, singer, model and pop icon.
- Earl Kemp, (born 1929), American publisher of science fiction and "sleazy" erotic paperbacks.
- Al Goldstein (1936 – 2013)
- Dian Hanson (born November 2, 1951)
Publishing houses
Events and publications
1920s
1950s
- First issue of Playboy, followed by Penthouse (1969), and Hustler (1974).
- Fetish illustrations by Eric Stanton
- In the early 1950s, photographer Irving Klaw filmed a very profitable series of burlesque features, usually featuring star cheesecake model Bettie Page and various lowbrow comedians (including future TV star Joe E. Ross). Page's most famous features are Striporama (1953), Varietease (1954), and Teaserama (1955), see American burlesque.
1960s
- Naked Came the Stranger (1969) by Penelope Ashe
- First successful films of Russ Meyer
- 1962: EROS by Ralph Ginzburg
1970s
In a classic example of détournement, Earl Kemp published an illustrated edition of Report of the Commission on Obscenity and Pornography (1970) for Greenleaf Publishing and subsequently served a one year prison sentence for doing so.
Pornographic film boom:Mona (1970) - Behind the Green Door (1972) - Deep Throat (1972) - The Devil in Miss Jones (1973) - Score (1973) The Opening of Misty Beethoven (1976)
And then there is the anti-pornography documentary film Perversion for Profit (1965) which points out the natural link between new media and erotica:
- "Now, you might ask yourself, why this sudden concern? Pornography and sex deviation have always been with mankind. This is true. But now, consider another fact. Never in the history of the world have the merchants of obscenity, the teachers of unnatural sex acts, had available to them the modern facilities for disseminating this filth. High-speed presses, rapid transportation, mass distribution. All have combined to put the vilest obscenity within reach of every man, woman and child in the country." —George Putnam, narrator.
And the films of Alex de Renzy, Radley Metzger and Joe Sarno.
21st century
Erotic photography
In the 1950s , there is the fetish photography by John Willie and towards the end of the century that of Richard Kern and Eric Kroll. Mark Rotenberg collects erotic photography.
Bibliography
- SIN-A-RAMA: Sleaze Sex Paperbacks of the Sixties, 2004, Jay A. Gertzman, Adam Parfrey and Lydia Lunch
- Bookleggers and Smuthounds (1999) by Jay A. Gertzman
- Sex: The Revolution (2008), TV documentary
- The Other Hollywood: The Uncensored Oral History of the Porn Film Industry (2006) by Legs McNeil, with Jennifer Osborne and Peter Pavia
See also