Where to draw the line of decency?

Artists for ages have depicted sex – fascinating frescos in Pompei and Herculaneum hardly leave anything to the imagination, albeit in keeping with the permissiveness of the respective time period, graphic sexual images have been kept away from public glare.

This is no more the case. Exhibits in commercial galleries having explicit content seem are on the rise. Currently, London based Simon Lee Gallery is showcasing works by Larry Clark. This American photographer’s series, entitled ‘Kiss the Past Hello’ in Paris last year saw was banned under-18-year-olds. It apparently had explicit ‘sex & drug taking’ content.

Again in London, Alison Jacques has just had an exhibition curated by the Scissor Sisters. Among the works on view were some of famous homoerotic images by Mapplethorpe like ‘Untitled (Milton Moore)’. Pilar Corrias showed last year works by the US photographer Leigh Ledare. It had explicit images and videos, making for an uncomfortable viewing. The Luxembourg-Dayan gallery in New York has exhibited works from ‘Made in Heaven’ series by Jeff Koons, containing graphic photos and sculptures full of sexual acrobatics.

Sometimes such explicit subject matter puts galleries and museums in a rather difficult position, as they have to steer a tricky path between exhibiting and documenting artistic practice in all its forms, at the prospect of incurring public outrage. Quoting academic and sociologist András Szanto, Georgina Adam of The Financial Times notes in an insightful article (The hard sell): “The 80s and 90s were marked by the fearsome Aids epidemic, anxiety; the feminist art of the earlier decade was scandalous in what it depicted. So where to draw the line between pornography and art?"

“Every age has its ‘Olympia’, another expert mentions, referring to Manet’s portrait of a naked courtesan (1863) that provoked uproar. “Today the threshold for making such outrageous sexual statements is much higher. Art is a mirror of society.”