Assholes

Photographs and commentary on a delicate and forbidden topic...

Photographs by R.C. Hörsch

Essays, fiction and Commentary by Betty Dodson, Cathy Tavel, Ariel Hart, Thomas Roche, S.E. Stokowski and others.

(NOTE: Hardcover, 12 x 12 inches, 62 pages)

Brain Farts (An Introduction)

Musings by S.E. Stokowski

Penises... dispense waste fluid and half of the equation of life itself. Through the same tube. From the same opening. They are organs of pleasure. Sometimes great pleasure. They are regarded as filthy and obscene. They must always be covered and obscured. They should never be acknowledged or discussed. Especially in front of children or women. They are not a fit object for prose or poetry or artistic investigation.

Vaginas... the wonderous cavity behind the vulva through which babies exit the womb and adjacent the urethra that dispenses waste fluid. It is the gateway to the womb where sperm and ova, the wonderous components of life are nurtured and grown. They are also organs of great pleasure. But they, too, are regarded as filthy and obscene. and must always be covered and obscured. They, too, should never be acknowledged or discussed. They are not a fit object for prose or poetry or artistic investigation.

.Assholes... dispense solid waste and have no other biological function. No redeeming qualities although most mammals find ways to utilize them for pleasure. They are certainly regarded as the most filthy and obscene area of the anatomy and must always be covered and obscured. They, too, should never be acknowledged or discussed. They, too, are not a fit object for prose or poetry or artistic investigation.

This is a book....of photographs centered on the area of human anatomy bounded by the anal sphincter or asshole. All are by photographer R. C. Hörsch and were shot over a period of almost fifty years. Some are abstract, some are explicit and some are grotesquely explicit. None obscure their subject matter in fuzzy metaphor. Some are in color and some are in more artistic monochrome. Some depict sexual activity that is a felony in many places. A few may even rise to the level of fine art.

They are what they are.

Here’s a thought... your reaction to these images likely says more about you than it does about the images themselves. Are you titillated? Shocked? Disgusted? Aroused? Is your interest (if any) clinical? Artistic? Prurient? Are you in the mainstream of Western society that views the human body as somehow dirty, shameful and disgusting? Do you believe that the mechanics surrounding the creation of life are not fit for poetry or prose or artistic exploration? Do you simultaneously believe, for example, that your god created humans in his own image but that the unadorned result of that creation is obscene? Are you sophomoric, one-dimensional and childish in your view of sex and sexual images and representations? Or are you sophisticated and blasé? Do you see beauty in these images? Whatever. Somehow, I would be very surprised to find that you are bored.

So be shocked or enlightened. Praise or condemn. Tolerate or destroy. See beauty or filth. Be aroused or disgusted. And if you masturbate, don’t get the pages stuck together.

You are what you are.

When you figure it out, let me know.

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