The Curation of Money Shots: Art Porn in Destricted

• Marilyn Minter’s Green Pink Caviar

It turns out the word “destricted” means, roughly, the opposite of the word “restricted,” that famous generator of the letter “R” on our movies. A new video program, Destricted, is a collection of contemporary artists releasing works that you won’t see in museums and galleries, for the most part, because some of them are fairly hardcore. These short pieces of film are where porn and art, for these artists, meet. They won’t be screening in theaters in Seattle, but you can order Destricted on Amazon, or put it on your Netflix queue.

What do you want from porn, and what do you want from art? Yeah. Not the same thing. So it’s hard to get these pieces right, and easy to get them wrong (there’s not much in between). Richard Prince’s re-filming of a “golden-era” “House Call” fantasy film from the the ’70s only makes me want to punch Richard Prince in the outdated balls, as much of his politically questionable work does. (I’m from upstate New York, you bourgie tourist. I digress.)

In Gaspar Noé’s We Fuck Alone, masturbation, alienation, and violence all come together as if they were made that way. It’s a brutal piece of filmmaking, but somehow generic, too, like a kink. I resisted.

• Matthew Barney’s Hoist

What I did not resist was Matthew Barney’s Hoist, part of a longer piece that screened in Seattle in April. It featured a man, naked, with a buoy-like object dangling from his ass, his muscle-bound (of course: this is Barney) body suspended on the underside of a vehicle. This man rubbed up against the vehicle’s spinning, lubricated camshaft while the vehicle rolled down the streets for Carneval, a woman climbing the branches of the parade float and doing her own operations up in the fresh air. In Destricted, this shorter version happens strictly below decks, and it’s disgusting and it’s hot. The opening scene alone is worth the rental. I won’t tell you more. Except to say that the truck is described, in the PR notes, “as the ultimate strap-on.”

• Larry Clark’s Impaled

Another work that works is Larry Clark’s Impaled. Its rough title is misleading; it’s actually tender. Clark, the photographer/filmmaker/regular-subject-of-censorship, interviews young men about the way porn has affected their sex lives. They’re in Clark’s office auditioning to be hooked up with a working porn actress; once the young man is chosen, he interviews the actresses and chooses one, and they make a fuck film. Even given the tight formula, everything that happens is slightly unexpected. Clark can be cold, but Impaled is both hot and warm.

In the US version (UK version here), the other artists are luscious painter Cecily Brown; Marilyn Minter, the lover of tongues and stilettos (here she creates another filthy highlight); and Sante D’Orazio and Tunga. You know you want them.