More Sex, More Sex, and More Sex― In Art
Well, I had more people open the last post on The Art of Sex than any other post. What does that tell me? You guys have the same attraction to sexuality that artists have had from time immemorial. The Venus De Willendorf has obviously tweaked your interest―at least those of you leaning along in the same lines that I lean.
Sondra and I just watched a movie called Howl about the poet Alan Ginsberg, and his coming of age into great renown with his revolutionary poem, Howl. James Franco played the young artist Ginsberg, and one of the main foci was the “obscenity trial” levied against his publisher, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, for publishing Howl in the first place. The language of the poem is visceral, and in the 1950s being gay was deemed “deviant behavior.” Sex is exposed not for any shock effect, but to express the truth of what Ginsberg was living and feeling. And Truth is Beauty, as Keats said in his Ode to the Grecian Urn.
THE BEAUTY OF NATURAL FORM
Some of Ginsberg’s imagery is even a little too much for me. But I am aware of the times in which sexual suppression needed to be confronted and sexual preferences were shamefully limited in the public view of acceptability. And, the horrors of WWII were fresh in the creative minds of artists in the 1950s. So I tout the artistic virtues and raw courage of Ginsberg who blazed a trail, to be brutally honest and open about sexuality.
I am solidly heterosexual. And though many would say that marriage and monogamy are limitations these days, and monogamy goes against the nomadic nature of the male psyche, I opt for committed monogamy with my wife―my one woman―and reserve my appreciation of the female form in my artistic life.
The human body is undeniably beautiful in the scope of artistic observation. The beauty of everything, for that matter, whether considered “sacred” or “profane,” is possible to view when all judgments are set aside. Everything is holy and sacred. And the Ascendency of the Spirit can travel along these lines of Beauty that does not exploit, but rather finds the sweet zone of a conjugal consent and compassion. Love, in the end, is all that matters as the Source and reason for being of any artistic expression.
The tattoo of beauty on this female torso is unbelievable. The perfect melding of a natural scene with the natural contours of this woman is meritorious of high art. The tattoo artist’s sensitivity far surpasses the “I love Betty” tattoos one used to associate with this underbelly of bodily adornment. The eye of the bird is perfectly aligned with the navel; the branch of blossoms bends perfectly to incorporate the labia majora of the hair-free Pussy. This day and age, having a well-crafted tattoo is considered as acceptable as a designer wardrobe. And this gal has the Gucci of all tattoos!
Diverging to the High Italian Renaissance, Raphael’s young Jesus is not tattooed, in the least, but there is a captivating quality to the way the artist put Him before us in the most humble but astute rendering. Just like the birds and branches of the elegant tattoo, we are given the gift of view into the sexuality of the Christ toddler. His penis is not hidden under the figleaf of the day but rather cradled in the folds of the Holy Mother’s royal blue raiment. Beauty again beacons us to notice and appreciate a providence of physical form not of our own making, but from the sacred well of Nature Herself.
THE BEAUTY OF THE PHALLUS AND PUSSY
All of us guys have a Cock, just like all of you gals have a Pussy. Penis and Vagina may be the more scientific names we ascribe to these essential body-parts, yet they hardly describe the broader and deeper Sacred qualities of these beautiful human attributes. Why should we shrink with shame from even discussing them? Like the subject of death and overcoming it, we don’t bring certain subjects into the living rooms of our most noted conversations. Why? Would we rather fight about politics or fall into fear over the next Carona Virus? It seems so.
The Phallic form creates and emits a Power of Life, just as the Pussy creates and receives this Power.
This garden of stone phallic forms has a beauty of undeniable Power. The verticality of the male erection parallels all plant forms to grow upwards toward the sun. The tree trunks in this ancient garden are more like kindred souls of the same male principle of Ascension. Man gets “hard” in order to “connect” with the heavens, in this case, the heavens of His Lover. Be it God in Sacred Glory, or female or male in this no-holds-barred, LGBTQ age of egalitarian acceptance, sharing with one’s Lover the nectars of Life is the Joy of creation and the Joy of a shared physical existence altogether. And if this sharing was not so unmistakenly Joyous, we may have died out as a race eons ago.
The Pussy is one of the most beautiful portals in the universe, in my book. I am in awe of Her beauty. I am not exaggerating. Why would one ever exploit Her? Rather seeking Her blessing, Her wisdom, Her grace, Her soft enveloping touch, Her shelter from the storm of worldly troubles―these are just a few of my reasons for adoration. I could wax on, easily, effortlessly, and exquisitely on cherishing the Goddess of Beauty and the principal receptor of Her royal charge―Her Pussy.
A lot of Spiritual Masters have renounced the fleshy attributes of physical existence for Spiritual benefits. Even A Course in Miracles states, “I am not a body; I am Spirit.” Yet, in these physical dimensions, a transmutation is necessary in order to bring about a “forgiven world” in which the body is a communication device to transmit the Spiritual Qualities of Love, Peace, Joy, Innocence, Grace, and Beauty. These are eternal states of Being. And sexuality, being part of the “communication device,” can be used in the service of the ego or the Holy Spirit. Sacred Adoration of the Beauty of the human form, and the extended Joy of the sexual aspects of the human form, are far more enlightened than the gross denial of the flesh that has racked the religious orders into the shame and guilt of submission. God’s will for us is perfect happiness Now, in these bodies Now. And the Joy of Sex is just as much a part of feeling innocent and good, of perfect happiness, like any other communication in the holiness of these physical planes.
ALL TOGETHER NOW
“Let sex be totally innocent in its sharing, and all the shame from past abuses fall away.”
“Let Spirit come fully into flesh, and enliven this union with a joy unsurpassed.”
“I am grateful for this Gift of God, this sexual play of sacred sensation.”
“One of the greatest joys of Life Itself, let it not diminish or fall by the wayside of worn-out resignations.”
“Instead, allow this coital energy to bring immortality to those with gracious and holy appreciation for this great gift.”
These are lines from Ode # 328, Divine Mother of All Coital Bliss, in my volume of poetry, Odes to the Divine Mother.
I did a series of paintings to celebrate this Holy Union. It is a Communion in my eyes, of the Divine Forces entrusted with us―for two souls to join together in a Coital Bliss. It is a harmonic convergence of seeming polarities of opposites that come together to end the separation of opposites. In Coital Bliss there are no opposites. Two become One. The Male melds into the Female and the result is Divine Ecstasy.
Sexual Energy is a Creative Force in the Universe that gives life to everything, and we do well to embrace it in innocence and reverence of its inherent Power and Beauty.
Here are a couple more of those coital communions:
“I am at your feet, Divine Mother of this sacrament of all sexual communion.”
Thank you guys for joining me in this Art Look: More Sex and More Sex in Art. I suspect I am not shocking you too much, but rather bringing a subject into the light that is too often denigrated into the dark. The sexual revolution may have started in the 1950s with Allan Ginsberg and the like. But the groundwork started was incomplete. If amidst the “Sex and Drugs and Rock & Roll” you distill down the real combo into its essential parts, you end up with sex and nothing else.
I will leave you with these images of beautiful phallic forms that speak self-evidently of their potency.
Love,
