I’m sorry to say that on our last trip to New York, we missed this museum.
Peruse an 1814 sketchbook by the Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai and eventually you’ll come across a bashful, wide-eyed octopus. You’d never guess that the innocent creature leads a secret life of debauchery. But a few years later, there he is on a woodblock print, still wide-eyed, now presented by Hokusai in a moment of infamous passion—his bulbous head pushed between the legs of a young woman, delivering a rather well-received session of cunnilingis. Hilarious and startling, it’s just one example of the explicit shunga, or “pictures of spring,” in an exhibition at the Museum of Sex surveying four centuries of Japan’s cartoonish pornography.
Next time!
(via 3quarksdaily and Jennifer Ouellette)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dream_of_the_Fisherman%27s_Wife
Christianity sure doesn’t have anything like this!
(A link from Henry Clay’s site, above. Thanks, Henry!)
Not to mention… (sorry for the URL name, folks!)
http://www.dildoart.com/fsm/2.html
Dang, Molly, you beat me by three minutes!
Clarification:
I’d just seen that Wiki before.
Not mine, but wanted to share.
This one is kind of creepy but it reminds me of a certain explicit octopus picture posted here recently. Don’t open it if you are at work or under 18, even though it showed up on a “safe” google search.
http://www.gregkucera.com/_images/shunga/shunga_octopus_web.jpg
Oddly enough, here’s my random quote right now:
If you have a dark bushy mustache, shave it off NOW.
Rack Jite
Who says that the universe doesn’t have a sense of humor?
Where’s Ghastly when you need him? (NSFW LINK WARNING)
Oh, yeah? Does it have a Museum of Menstruation? (I’ve never been there, even though it’s quite literally within walking distance of me. Can you blame me?)
See also the review at roadsideamerica.com.
Cultural museums like these are valuable.
“Hilarious and startling”
Why they think they need to promote the pornography I can’t see. ;-) But it’s a good description of shunga in general.