THE MODERN EROTIC

[Gabriella Daris]

Thought the forthcoming conference, on what I would call, 'The Performativity of Digital Love,' which is actually drawn from Lou Andreas Salome's "The Erotic" may appeal to you, in addition to Alain Badiou's "In Praise of Love" where he discusses the relationship between digital love, drama, and his "scene of the two" love. GD

THE MODERN EROTIC

A multi-disciplinary international conference at the Freud Museum, London

8 June 2013, 9.30am - 5.00pm

http://www.freud.org.uk/events/75085/the-modern-erotic/

Lou Andreas Salomé wrote The Erotic (1911) before she met Freud. The recent English translation of her groundbreaking book encourages us to consider how a century of social change has affected erotic behaviour, and what this may mean for psychoanalysis. In a world of online porn, internet dating and ‘digital emotions’, what are the contours of ‘the erotic’ in the world today?

This interdisciplinary conference explores the significance of contemporary erotic life for human relationships and the questions it poses for psychoanalytic theory and practice.

[George Hunka]

Alas I was unable to attend, but a provocative subject nonetheless, especially concerning the performativity of language itself.

[Felix de Villiers]

This subject has always interested me, be it in life literature, the cinema or the theatre.AS often I see I'm running out of time, so I'll come back and stick just to one or two points. It's a pity more material from this conference is not available, be it on video or in writing.

At this very moment I'm feeling confused about explicit sex in the arts and whether they aesthetic value or quality of a work. Picassos drawings of men and women copulating are also good drawings. It would be hard to get people actually fucking on the stage for many reasons, in films less hard but here they are usually lying on top of each other and going through the motions of love making without their genitals being shown. More about this later.

One thing that still does seem to be taboo is the male organ as opposed to the female and especially in erection, and this even in erotic films. I have only seen an erect cock in about two films and was told of another.Why still this taboo? Maybe this was discussed at the conference.Erotic suggestion is another matter. I remember a film whose title I forget in which a famous actress is sitting on her bed while a much younger man is getting ready to fuck her. We know it's going to happen but all we see is the young man getting undressed, untying his belt and this is very exciting. What role between sexual excitation and the arts?

[Felix de Villiers]

George Hunka said:

Alas I was unable to attend, but a provocative subject nonetheless, especially concerning the performativity of language itself.

George, I don't mean to be in the slightest personally offensive,but the expression 'the performativity of language' sounds singularly unerotic. I tried the site 'theatre minima' so as to get hold of something to discuss but my PC tells me it dioesn't exist. But I see the forum now on the left side of this page and will have a look at it.

[Felix de Villiers]

Elsewhere I Expressed some disappointment about the lack of discussion and Theron Schmidt advised me to look at other groups and forums like this one.Not much luck here either or elsewhere. I expect I should accept that PP is not that kind of site. before exiting I'll just add a few comments to my last letter

I said something about the role of erotic excitement it the arts, esp. film and theatre.. For the moment I prefer to suspend that question to say that absolutely nothing is outside the province of the arts: it all depends on how it is done.

I have come up against that problem personally. I have just finished writing my autobiography and after some debate with friends I decided to leave some explicitly erotic sections. Now that they are there I'm satisfied and find them an integral part of the whole.

I have the feeling that pornography and Puritanism are like mirror images of each other.and, in a more humane world, should give way to one another and disappear as separate entities. While I object strongly to Puritanism I'm not in the slightest moralistic about pornography. But it does not excite me.We all have our personal slants on sex, and mechanical pumping puts me off if anything; I must have a surrounding story.None of the porno films or videos I have seen qualify as works of art, or as artistic or as effective performance.