Tuesday, 24 March 2015

The Ancient Tentacle Erotica

Tentacle erotica is a type of pornography that integrates traditional pornography with some elements of bestiality. They come under hentai titles with tentacle creatures having sexual intercourse with female characters. Fantasy, horror, or science-fiction themes were used to provide the storyline. Creatures with tentacles in erotic setting existed before animated pornography. The famous woodblock print by Hokusai Katsushika appeared in 1920. It was entitled “the Dream of the Fisherman's Wife”.

Shunga or erotic art were seen as sexual guidance for young couple during Hokusai’s times. It was the Japanese Karma Sutra enjoyed by men and women of all classes and superstitions and customs supports this claim. Samurai used shunga as an amulet against death. Merchant treat them as talisman to protect their warehouse from fire. [Source Wikipedia]. Shunga is literally translated as spring art. For Japanese spring refer to the blossom period and it was traditional to present a bride with ukiyo-e depicting erotic scenes from the Tale of Genji.

picture from wikipedia

The picture was rated third sexiest works of art ever by the Guardian. Pablo Picasso was took second place in the Guardian's rating. Ironically Picasso was greatly influence by Hokusai. Picasso painted his own version in 1903 that has been shown next to Hokusai's original in exhibits on the influence of 19th-century Japanese art on Picasso's work [Source Wikipedia].

Western critics such as Edmond de Goncourt and Jack Hillier interpreted the work as a rape scene. Based on the text above the image, the woman and the creatures express their mutual sexual pleasure from the encounter. Scholar Danielle Talerico is in the opinion that de Goncourt and Hillier would have seen it apart from the Kinoe no Komatsu collection and without understanding the text and visual references, depriving it of its original context.

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