The Porn Taboo: Drawing

Undivided Attention

I have been concentrating a lot on improving my drawing skills recently – I have put a few pictures up here which I wasn’t really happy with, and realised that the problem wasn’t a lack of skill, or even a lack of patience, but simply that I hadn’t left myself enough time. It isn’t even the case that a good drawing takes all that much more time than a poor one, but the feeling of being rushed makes a lot of difference, and having a tight timescale restricts my choices in a way that does not agree with me. If I am pressed for time, then I need to go through a relatively bare process of pencilling in only the outlines, inking with a ballpoint (as most art pens take too long to dry, and the pencils need to be rubbed out prior to scanning) and colouring on the computer. There’s no leeway to leave it for a couple of hours to see if any errors in the figure drawing or layout leap out at me, and there’s no time to wait for watercolours or ink to dry. My technique had been improving, but these restrictions had made me feel as though my work was deteriorating, and it had taken a lot of the joy out of the process.

Which is all well and good, and easily enough fixed (as I hope you’ve been able to tell from the last couple of pictures), but in dealing with that problem I happened across another, slightly trickier one. I realised that, while I have no problem at all drawing naked people (as you may have noticed), I have a great big block against drawing anything which I would term porn. I don’t find it so hard to draw things when they’re intended to illustrate a point, but it’s difficult to make anything explicit, or which is intended to be arousing. While it’s a lot of effort to overcome this reticence, it makes the difference between feeling like I am making what I want to make, and feeling like I’m chickening out. It’s worth the discomfort, not only because I’ve always disliked shying away from things just because they’re difficult, but because I feel like I have a chance to produce the kind of porn which I want to be in the world, and that’s a rare enough opportunity that it’s worth taking advantage of.

Of course, this aversion is a learned reaction. Part of it, good old English prudery, is a cultural thing, and is worth working through for its own sake, and part of it is a straightforward reaction. I frequently drew my own porn with various degrees of success, and just as frequently got into trouble for it, throughout my childhood. I didn’t draw anything of the sort, from the age of fifteen until last year, apart from some nude life drawing in art classes, and even then it was almost impossible to put any detail between the navel and the knee. I can’t help but wonder how many artists, who would otherwise be producing marvellous, hot material, have been hindered by the same kind of thing. It occurs to me that, under these circumstances, artists who are less worried about the taste, quality, and impact of their work, are more likely to be able to overcome these fears, and to persevere long enough to actually have their art distributed. No wonder it’s so hard to find material which is skilfully and mindfully done, and which is also hot.

All of which has made me wonder – did you ever draw your own porn? Do you still, and if not, what made you stop? What sort of thing did you draw, and why? Was it because you couldn’t get hold of any other material, or just couldn’t get any of the kind of thing you liked, or was it the act of drawing you enjoyed?