Cover Story

by Rachel Martindale

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Messages in Erotic Art Mirror and Influence Society

Left to right: Jeff Spackman, Brad Harper and Mark Terry.

The Voice interviewed a panel of art experts to discuss the reasons for and the effects of erotic art on American culture and society.

Jeff Spackman: A self-taught children's book illustrator, Spackman sells his prints through a Web site as well as at the Saturday Market.

Brad Harper: A theologian at MBC, he has "encountered art because art has been a major means of expressing theology throughout the history of the church."

Susanna Lundgren: Professor of art and art history at Warner Pacific for 13 years, she has an undergraduate degree in art history from Reed College and two degrees in painting from Portland State University.

Mark Terry: He has taught for 26 years, teaching art history, ceramics, and sculpture for eight years at George Fox University. He received his undergraduate art major at Willamette University and his master's degree in art from Western Oregon State.

The Voice: Does erotic art have a negative effect on culture and individuals?

Spackman: In our culture, there's maybe a little bit too much obsession with that. It's something that I haven't really investigated very much or thought about very much.

Harper: I don't think it necessarily has to be [problematic] on all occasions. But in its American iteration, it's probably almost always problematic because contemporary American erotic art is pornography in that category, and that, of course, is destructive rather than constructive.

Can you have art that has naked persons in it that's constructive or something that's primarily to comment on or question the values of culture, and is that a good thing? Sure, I think so. A lot of it's going to be the motivation of the artist.

Lundgren: If the art teaches us something or it has a reflection of something true -- that doesn't necessarily mean attractive or beautiful -- but something true about the human experience that makes people think or reflect, then it has a good effect.

If, on the other hand, the only purpose for the work is to hurt or to titillate or to control or some other quality of that nature or it's just plain bad taste, then you question how it fits into a definition of art anyway.

Terry: I'm not sure that my culture would agree with that, but I believe so. I think that one of the reasons, based on its eroticism or not, is that we often don't pay any attention to the purpose or the message.

The Voice: Should the government do more censorship on art bordering on pornography or obscenity?

Spackman: I'm kind of leery of the government getting into censorship of art. I generally don't think it's a good idea. I wish that people themselves were better at censoring it. I guess by a case-by-case basis it could be decided.

Harper: The government should be careful not to fund art that is broadly offensive. But on the other hand, the government should not disallow that kind of thing. We need to protect our First Amendment rights in this country.

We need to protect the rights of artists to be able to do, in essence, whatever they want to do. I think that's best for the country in the long run. The main issue is protection of children. I wouldn't want the government to get broadly involved in censoring art at all, except when it comes to the protection of children.

Lundgren: I'm really against government censorship if it has to do with their coming into running galleries or telling people what they may or may not show that's intended to be an artistic production. That's more like mind control.

If, on the other hand, [censorship] has to do with fair protection, especially of the young, now I think that's a whole different point.

If it's truly art and it has to do with artists creating art for an audience that is an adult audience, a thinking audience, then the government has no business controlling it.

Terry: I'm really frightened of censorship, but I think that there are places it's appropriate to censor.

The Voice: Have American views been changing regarding the erotic in art?

Spackman: There's probably more acceptance of it. It's kind of a reflection of how our culture is changing.

Harper: Certainly they're changing because America is much more open to the openly erotic in all of its medium throughout than it was 30 years ago.

Lungren: It's hard to say. We're in a period of sort of cutting down freer thought. A lot of different issues are being confused, and then blanket judgments or statements are being made without distinguishing the categories very much.

It isn't much different from what it's always been, which is that the more intellectualized aspects of these areas is being curtailed.

But it would seem as if the more criminal versions of it -- again, where the artistic component is suspect anyway -- is probably going along merrily just as well as it's ever gone.

Mark Terry: My gut response would be, yeah, I think so. I think that in general, we are far more accepting of eroticism on all kinds of levels. When I was a kid, Fred and Wilma Flintstone slept in separate twin beds. I think the American view toward the erotic in art is absolutely much more acceptable -- the difference in what you can show on a magazine stand in a grocery store.

We see much more flesh, we see much more action, we see much more things that would have been rated X aren't even more than PG.

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