Erotic Redemption of the Self

Today, pornography and erotica are common scapegoats for the political and religious cultures that hold sway over so much of the nation. This wallpaper represents a challenge to the reflexive notion that erotica is “bad”, in that it attempts to visually define the concept of “erotica” as a necessary mechanism for the redemption of the imagination and even the awakening of a genuine sense of selfhood. For a verbal component to assist in that definition, I can do no better than to quote Anais Nin: “Eroticism is one of the basic means of self-knowledge, as indispensable as poetry.”

I think that it is normally wrong-headed to explain the symbols in any work of art, but in this case I think it is not only helpful but even necessary, lest there be any catastrophic misunderstanding about the intent of this image. The finest erotica is that which stimulates our imagination, and helps us to shine a light in corners of our psyche that normally lie in the darkness, unseen by even our conscious selves. For this reason, that it is a probing of ourselves, erotica is necessarily chaste, even when it is naughty. In visual terms, then, the largest difference between erotica and pornography is the degree to which that chastity is respected by the camera, or the voyeuristic eye of the viewer. Hence, in this wallpaper, the hand covering the naked crotch is a sign of reflexive and redemptive chastity, an enforced aversion of the voyeur’s eyes, even as the written word represents the expansive and essentially erotic stimulation of the human imagination.

“Pornographers subvert this last, vital privacy; they do our imagining for us. They take away the words that were of the night and shout them over the roof-tops, making them hollow.” ~ George Steiner.

For lot’s more cool wallpapers, be sure to visit my gallery:
*Laurion

Stock Photo Credits:

This wallpaper is a photo-manipulation, using the stock photos from the following stock image sources:

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Jordo, at Stock Exchange ( [link] ), image ref. num. 112494_2950.

An Artisitc Note:

This wallpaper is the second of a series on the topic of Christian Erotica and Christian Porn. If you’re interested in more details on this series, or what exactly I mean by Christian Erotica and Christian Porn, then please look in my journal ([link])! Please note that the first two wallpapers in this series attempt to achieve a personal, visual definition of secular “pornography” and “erotica”, for the purposes of building a base of visual terminology from which to work. For my visual definition of “pornography”, see: [link]

While this is largely a conceptual wallpaper, I am using it to make a political commentary on an inherently political topic: the potentially redemptive value of pornography and erotica in the social and religious context of present-day society. If you happen to disagree with me … then make your own wallpaper and set the record straight.

Attention Wallpaper Lovers:

Wallpapers get a lot of downloads, but they seldom get very many comments. If you like a wallpaper (by me or anyone else), please please please give it a fave, and leave a comment saying why you like it! And if you don't like it, tell us why! This is very important to those of us who make the wallpapers you download, and not just for reasons of ego-gratification. Some people think of wallpapers as so-much eye-candy ... but they are so much more also. Since you download it onto your desktop, a wallpaper can be a very personal choice, as it is something that stares back at you from your monitor everytime you start your computer. The production of decent wallpapers, like any other kind of art, requires feedback, comments and criticism! So much for my rant ... enjoy the wallpapers, and say something, damnit!!!

Attention Digital Artists:

Have you thought about posting some of your work as wallpapers? The DA community is very much about exploring avenues for creating digital art that is more than "just" eye-candy. But, sometimes, it's fun to remember that art can be as much about function as form, and one of the most traditional ~practical~ uses of digital art is as wallpapers. You might enjoy making and sharing wallpapers that, hopefully, look good and yet make the viewer stop and think for a second, or at the very least do a double-take. You might appreciate the challenge of creating a personal system of syntagmatics that successfully presents complex issues in a "pop-art" medium that tends to be highly iconic in nature. Finally, you might feel a sense of mission in working in a DA genre that really hasn't fully evolved beyond the representation of eye-candy as art. Anyways, think about it ...