Anthony Christian
Anthony Christian
From time immemorial, Man has celebrated his sexuality through art: sometimes he has paralleled his sexual and spiritual joys, resulting in such wonders as India’s Khajaraho Temple which, due to its colossal size has survived the dreaded censor and centuries of puritanical hypocrisy. Most erotic art however, not being on such a grand scale, has been vulnerable to the tyrannical censor, who enjoyed it himself whilst hiding it away from the common man, allowing him to see only what those in power considered suitable as a means to keep him under their strict political or religious thumb.
In spite of tyrants, however, artists have continued to create, from the highly erotic Illuminated Manuscripts of medieval monasteries to the great Shunga paintings of Japan, from the miniatures of 16th and 17th Century Rajasthan to the intricate ivories of China, or, in the West, from the hands of masters as diverse as Rembrandt and Courbet to Beardsley and von Bayros–artists who have produced the great body of erotic art that exists today, but has been hidden until recently.
In fact, the first thing that would amaze any student about to embark on a study of erotic art, is the sheer quantity of what has been produced; then surely he would be further amazed that so many people had worked so hard to keep it more or less unknown. Even the artists themselves would keep their more daring works well hidden, in fear for their very lives for having created it. Happily the censor, the blackhead on the face of society, is now being slowly but steadily squeezed out, and so one can begin to get a clearer idea of the vastness and true greatness of this genre, especially through publications such as Lyall Stewart’s Erotic Art of the Masters or the Kronhausen two volume Erotic Art, or best of all the most extensive Klinger Catalogues.
Since early on in my youth I was horrified of censorship, never quite able to grasp the concept that one man might think he had the right to tell another what he could or could not look at. It has been with no delight that during my lifetime I have watched as, especially in literature and cinema, the critic has been made ever more redundant. I still feel, however, that the visual arts are not entirely free of prejudice, or a censorial force that prevents the genre of erotic art from being recognized as the truly great art form I believe it to be. I hope that my work might contribute to the universal recognition of this wonderful genre, which, after all, is the greatest possible celebration we can have of our very existence, and the love we might find in it. I hope that I might live to see this genre placed on at least equal footing with all other forms of art found in the museums of the world.
While I would never create a work of art that was shocking for no purpose but to be shocking, nor would I dream of censoring–or expecting anyone else to censor–any inspiration that I might receive. I paint for many reasons; one of them is to educate, and I hope by the beauty and integrity of my work that I may teach people the difference between pornography and great art, and shatter the last shackles bonding those imprisoned by ignorance or hypocrisy.
Art, I feel, is a journey; it is a voyage through the artist’s consciousness to an understanding of his vision, which inspired him. Art is the sea, in which every single work is an island that invites you to rest awhile, to feast your senses and find joys for your soul.
