Merveilleuse

Portrait of a young woman by Pierre-Narcisse, baron Guérin (1774 - 1833)

Guérin is not considered an erotic painter. He was a highly respected artist in his time, and most of his paintings were of grand historical subjects. So I was very surprised to see this painting by him at the now sadly retired Jahsonic blog--and also quite taken by it. It's gorgeous, isn't it?

There's a fine line between innocence and eroticism. In this painting, the eroticism rests in the position of her fingers. That's it. If her fingers were closed, it would be a whole different kind of painting. As it is, though, those beautifully painted hands highlight what they are supposed to conceal, and make her breasts fascinating and luscious and tempting.

Who is she? I don't know. But I can guess some things about her.

We're used to seeing women with elaborate hair in old paintings, so if you didn't know better, you might think she's a poor kitchen girl or something like that. But you'd be wrong. She's a trendsetter, a rebel. Knowing that Guérin's is French, and that he painted during the revolutionary period, I'm willing to bet all my donuts that this girl is a Merveilleuse.

During the French revolutionary period, rebellious young people began to wear outrageous clothing that mocked both the excesses of the old regime, and the restrictions of the new ones. The men called themselves Encroyables (The Incredibles) and looked like dandies on acid. The women were the Merveilleuses (the Marvelous Ones). They cropped their hair so they'd look like they were on their way to the guillotine, and wore transparent, Grecian style dresses.

It seems to me a Marveilleuse would love to be painted toplesss, glorying in her brutally cropped hair. Far from being simple, the girl painted above was a rebellious, priviledged wild child who ran in a pack of immodest cropped-haired girls and dangerously frivolous dandy-boys.

So yes, for ever and for always people have wondered "Just what in the hell are those kids wearing???"

Here's a little article on The Incroyables and the Merveilleuses if you want to learn more. And here's another one with pictures.

A little surreptitous frottage

Illustration by Louis Berthommé-Saint-André (1905-1977) Image source: AMEA

After doing a very small, very informal survey, I've discovered that a lot of people aren't familiar with this term. It happens to be one of my favorite words, so in the spirit of public education, the Erotická Revue brings you:

FROTTAGE

Frottage has two meanings: 1) a Surrealist art technique and 2) a form of non-penetrative sex


Meaning 1:

In an art context, frottage refers to making art by putting paper or canvas on top of a textured surface and rubbing it with pigment to capture an impression of the pattern below. Yes, just like brass rubbing. But it's more arty. The goal of frottage is to capture random, abstract patterns that either stand on their own as art, or can be embellished to make art. The Surrealist Max Ernst is usually credited with developing frottage in the 1920's.

Meaning 2:

Dry humping. That's such an unfortunate term for a very pleasurable practice. For that reason I I prefer frottage. However, I do use "dry humping" in my 2nd vampire book, viz. "Miércoles! I am dry humping Gregor Faustin in the back of a cab." In that case I used it because the character would use that term, not the fancier frottage.

Frottage is a wonderfully adaptable form of perversion. You can indulge in on the dance floor, the back seat of a car, or in a packed concert arena. It can be a form of foreplay, or the main act itself.

The term frotteur is used for someone who rubs up against people non-consensually. This is the DSM IV definition. But frotteur is just French "one who rubs" so I think we should take back the term from the shrinks. Are we not all frotteurs?

Frottage is a staple of lesbian sex, specifically the act of scissoring (more formally known as Tribadism), as illustrated by the lovely young ladies above. The word Tribadism comes from tribas, the Latin term for a woman who wanted to be the active sexual partner (ie top).

One thing I did not know about frottage when I began to write this post is the new-ish slang term, frot. According to Wikipedia, the word was developed out of frottage in the 1990's to describe a specifically male on male form of non-penetrative sex, offered up as a safer alternative to anal sex. The word frot, apparently, only refers to this particular form of man on man behavior.

It seems a wee bit strange to me that they get the corner on this word and specific definition, when what they are doing sounds to me like classic frottage--full on frottage ending in orgasm. Frottage is such a widespread practice, among people of all ages and sexual orientations, that I have trouble seeing why this act must be set apart as frot. But I do understand that this is a specific subculture and there seems to be some politics bound up in the definition, so I'll leave them to it. In time, I expect the the word frot will migrate, and end up being more universally used as a slang for frottage, no matter who's participating.

There are bears, and then there are bears

Illustration by Charles Raymond for a privately printed edition of
Venus in Furs by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, 1928

Laid in that white rush

Leda and the Swan, 16th c. copy of a lost original by Michaelangelo.

Image courtesy of Wikimedia

A sudden blow: the great wings beating still

Above the staggering girl, her thighs caressed

By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill,

He holds her helpless breast upon his breast.

How can those terrified vague fingers push

The feathered glory from her loosening thighs?

And how can body, laid in that white rush,

But feel the strange heart beating where it lies?

A shudder in the loins engenders there

The broken wall, the burning roof and tower

And Agamemnon dead.

Being so caught up,

So mastered by the brute blood of the air,

Did she put on his knowledge with his power

Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?

Leda and the Swan by William Butler Yeats, 1928

Show him what a woman is

Sixth-century Cham sculpture excavated at the site of My Thuat in Vietnam

Photograph: Leonard de Selva/Corbis

Adam and Eve were expelled from the garden over sex. But in the oldest story known to man, sex is the baptism into civilization, and the instrument of civilization is a woman's carnal skill.

See, I'm reading Gilgamesh, the Mitchell translation. It's amazing. At the start, a trapper comes to Gilgamesh, the king, reporting that he's seen a huge, wild man (Enkidu) at the watering hole, one that not only lives in communion with the beasts, but who is also springing his traps and setting animals free. He's terrified of the creature.

This is where it gets really interesting. Instead of sending out a hunting party to kill the creature, as would happen in 99% of stories, Gilgamesh sends one woman after it. Not to kill it, but to transform it. She's a sacred prostitute named Shamhat:


The trapper found Shamhat, Ishtar's priestess,
and they went off into the wilderness.
For three days they walked...
...Early in the morning
on the third day, Enkidu came and knelt down
to drink clear water with the antelope and deer.
They looked in amazement. The man was huge
and beautiful. Deep in Shamat's loins
desire stirred. Her breath quickened
as she stared at this primordial being.
"Look," the trapper said, "there he is.
Now use your love arts. Strip off your robe
and lie here naked, with your legs apart.
Stir up his lust when he approaches,
touch him, excite him, take his breath
with your kisses, show him what a woman is
The animals who knew him in the wilderness
will be bewildered, and will leave him forever."

She stripped off her robe and lay there naked,
with her legs apart, touching herself.
Enkidu saw her and warily approached.
He sniffed the air. He gazed at her body.
He drew close. Shamhat touched him on the thigh,
touched his penis, and put him inside her.
She used her love-arts, she took his breath
with her kisses, held nothing back, and showed him
what a woman is. For seven days
he stayed erect and made love wit her,
until he had had enough. At last
he stood up and walked toward the waterhole
to rejoin his animals. But the gazelles
saw him and scattered, the antelope and deer
bounded away. He tried to catch up,
but his body was exhausted, his life-force was spent,
his knees trembled, he could no longer run
like an animal, as he had before.
He turned back to Shamhat, and as he walked
he knew that his mind had somehow grown larger,
he knew things now that an animal can't know.


Enkidu goes on to become Gilgamesh's best friend, but his extraction from nature is beautiful, erotic and poignant.

Coming to her again and again

Fresco from the Casa del Centenario, Pompeii

Poem No. 2
Gaius Valerius Catullus (c. 84-54 B.C.)

Sparrow, my Lesbia's pet that she holds
between her breasts and lets flutter
in her hands and on her head, laughing
as he chirps coming to her again
and again. She teases him with her
fingertips, earning stinging pecks to
her delight. I wish I could dampen my
desire for her by playing with you, little
sparrow. I would dream of her naked smell
through your pecks to quench my miseries.

Translation by Ewan Whyte

An object fit for worship

I can't tell you how much I love this image. It's not even an image, it's an object. Many of the images I show here exist in abstraction. Remade into pixels, most images float free of both medium and context. This one, however, is firmly grounded on paper, and in time.

It is a well-loved image. It's spent a lot of time in a wallet, and has been passed around among friends. The left corner is worn off because that's the corner he held with his left hand while jerking off with his right hand.

The image itself is gorgeous. I'm no fan of the bj images where the woman looks like a wide mouthed bass latched onto a scud. This is gentle, almost reverent. That gorgeous cock is disembodied--an object for worship. In fact, the whole image is so simple and solemn it reminds me of a religious icon.


As with the last post, this card came from the Erotic Postcards page at AMEA. Please visit them to see similar images, as well as their other erotic collections.