Is Porn Art?

A few days ago, in a conversation with my good friend Lyndsey, a question surfaced: Can porn be art?

My answer, at the time not as articulate as the argument you have before you, was basically thus: When porn becomes art, it is no longer porn.

My answer was the result of a recent encounter with a definition of pornography that made a whole lot of sense. According to David Wong, pornography is anything you lose interest in after you climax. In one sense this is a definition as vague as Justice Potter Stewart's “I know it when I see it.” But in another sense it it perfectly describes my, and perhaps your, relationship to porn. Most importantly, it underlines its patently utilitarian nature.

Now, I am a man who very much wants porn to be art. As a fifteen year old I gravitated toward those movies with plots and elaborate sets and big budgets and loads of clever, though often butchered, dialogue. I harbored a wish to write fresh, original screenplays for sex flicks that could stand on their own without the sex. I liked the idea of erotic films that weren't simply about sex so much that it took me a long time to admit that I wouldn't like them so much without the sex.

I was enamored by the works of Michael Ninn. But lets face it, Latex and Shock aren't Chinatown or Apocalypse Now. Yes, they're pretty but you'll be hard press to find anyone who'll pop them into a DVD player for any reason other than getting off. I can tell you, as much as I praise the man, I've never watched a Michael Ninn movie straight through. For me, it's skip to my favorite scene. Get my rocks off. Take a nap.

Oscar Wilde said, “All art is utterly useless.” It stands and exists only for itself. Porn, by definition exists to tend to our prurient interests. It has a purpose, some many say a noble one. But until it ceases to serve that purpose it cannot be declared art.

Thousands of years from from now, our civilization will go the way of the Egyptians and the Maya. Our ways of life will be analyzed by people far different from us. I envision them being the epitome of sexual liberation. Their utter lack of repression will mean that the idea of pornography and the pleasure derived from it being verboten will be alien to these people. And these people will excavate the ruins of 21st century civilization and find porn by the boatloads and will be puzzled by it. They will lack the frame of reference to appreciate it for what it is: a masturbation tool. They will wonder, was this part of 21st century religion? Was this art?

A few thousand years ago, before pipes brought water into homes, before wine was corked in bottles, water and wine were ported in jars and vases. And people painted these jars and vases because that's what we human do. No one, not a single one of these vase painters, beamed with pride knowing that their “masterpiece” will be on display at the British Museum. They were just painting a water jug. The same way that guy from the graphics department designs a box cover for the latest Cougar DVD.