The Protagonist of the Erotic

Would you like to be living in whipped cream — soft, curtailed, radical tenderness? Or to root yourself like a luminescent rhododendron, with shallow roots but sure growth, nourished by affective intensities? Estelle Hoy’s ode to the life and oeuvre of Ocean Vuong calls us to this path: to be seen, to rebuild what was shattered. Amid the calls of fruit sellers, the sweetness of stripy cannoli stan...

Zinedine Zidane — ZZ, Zizou, Yazid — the legendary number 10. So many names for one of the most adored figures in the world’s most popular sport: football, of course. At once extraordinary and ubiquitous, he is a living myth — plastered on billboards yet quietly human, reserved away from the pitch. In this episode, Zidane is more than a player — he is the embodiment of desire, an eroticism that un...

Flickering lights, stealth shadows, grainy textures. Snowy mountains, rusted metal, and dilapidated compounds – Metal Gear Solid has turned on millions. In this episode, writer Théo Casciani slips between reality and fiction, creeps into Hideo Kojima’s gaming universe to explore lust as a narrative red herring, designed to entice but ultimately subverted by blunt emotions. What happens when the bo...

Metal, memory and material desire: today, curator Rita Ouédraogo devotes an episode to the designer Nifemi Marcus-Bello, celebrated for his human-centered approach, from public seating systems to pieces that question material histories. Set against the vibrant backdrop of Lagos’s workshops, this intimate portrait reimagines our sensuous connection to matter, guided by a deep, intuitive attentivene...

Sure, top floors have a striking erotic connotation; they're also the perfect vantage point to peer into the lives of others. High above Barcelona, yet grounded in sensuality, Huw Lemmey shares his admiration for Nazario Vera, the underground comic artist renowned for his punchy, sharp, and flamboyant portrayals of queer life. A cultural icon throughout the seventies and eighties, Nazario uses his...

We all have notebooks of our own, whatever form they take. Scribbles, words, whispers, desires, rants and erasures may be entered and so the body bounds and extends. Judith Vrancken dog-ears pages, spinning her encounter with the work of the choreographer Alexandra Bachzetsis, and the piece Notebook is, by no coincidence, an exploration of her own biography. How do we choose to present ourselves?...

Whether you're looking to send a poem to your lover or indulge in a moment of self-pleasure, Vladimir Lucien has recently penned a rhythmic and heartfelt ode to intimacy titled "uses of the erotic", published by the Academy of American Poets. It is inspired by Audre Lorde's influential 1978 essay on the erotic as power, where she asserts that "the erotic is not a question only of what we do; it is...

Who thinks it’s easy to be an ethical slut?  Martin Rombouts  shakes the sheets, and gossips pour out, wrinkle upside down, and twinkle. Questioning whether love is possible without the fantasy of ownership, Martin recounts the sexual game of calling himself Ken and his lover Barbie. If dolls are meant to project, distort, and sublimate our fantasies, feelings grow up unleashed and raw....

Hair grows through the echo of the past and the movement of the future. The hairdresser is a place of transformation, care, and conflict, where feelings weave like curls and rumours spin on the stool. Ayọ̀bámi Adébáyọ̀ delves into the intimate story associated with type 4c hair, the tightest curl pattern variation in black hair. This story unfolds through a series of vivid memories: a wide tooth c...

From the panic of wardrobe choices to the dissolution in between the anonymous bodies, McKenzie layers sensations of lust and fatigue. Droplets of sweat inside the thigh-high boots and hard beats unzip a universe in which dancing can help with the damage or switch on all sorts of futures. “A rave is just a pocket in time in which there's more time, but the pocket closes and spills us out.” In the...

The egg is the most naked thing Nina Folkersma has ever seen. Yet, it is magical and mysterious. By stretching the egg’s metaphor close to her body, Nina feeds imaginations about motherhood and fertility. Surrealist paintings and writings are explored to meditate on the beauty and awkwardness of sensuality. Find yourself in a former pharmacy on Madison Avenue in  New York  to listen to t...

Anne Carson is a literary superstar. At sixteen years old, she fell in love with the ancient Greek language and pursued her passion by translating Sappho, Sophocles and Euripides. From the end of the 1980s until today, Anne Carson has published a plethora of works that investigate the twists and turns of love, sexual yearning and despair, affirming the tragic beauty of the monstrous and the f...

A space of refuge and comfort where, while wrapped in bedlinens or a soft eiderdown quilt, our dreams and fantasies unfold. Under the clouds of the duvet, in the darkness, intimacies are exchanged between bodies, hands searching, flesh tenderly touched. A centrepiece of domesticity, the psychic landscape of the bed belongs to the private sphere. But, according to James Taylor-Foster, its role in c...

Clandestine. Blue. Sparkling and full of promise. The pristine surface of an empty swimming pool is like a sensual invitation. 'Jump into me,' it seems to beg. 'Plunge your body into my depths.' During a summer of heatwaves, writer and artist Lara Haworth found herself at the poolside surrounded by beach towels and bare flesh. Cooling off from the soaring temperatures, she recalls childhood crushe...

Singer. Dancer. Movie star. Activist. Afrofuturist. Android. Janelle Monáe is one of the most iconic pop stars of her generation. Her music is utterly addictive, full of infectious beats, bass-heavy funk, and that unmistakable voice, delicate and breathy, yet full of raw power. The high-concept songstress composes thematic albums, narrated by alter-ego Cindi Mayweather, a robot who dares to desire...

Fizzling on the tongue, sugary sweet and deliciously cool, there’s nothing quite like Coca-Cola on a hot day. Cracking open a bottle, Seb Emina takes a long, deep sip. The iconic carbonated soda has been adding flavour to our imaginations for decades. Tall glasses, dripping moisture, their caramel-coloured contents glistening with bubbles and cubes of ice, adorn billboards. Coke is...

'Are you in a serious relationship with your smartphone?' The question headlines long-form news articles warning of the dour effects of incessant usage and screen addiction. Yet, for Nadine Botha , the intimacy we share with our handheld devices may be far more peculiar than we think. After all, it serves us both the overstimulation of the 24-7 office and the delicious jolts of adrenaline from tex...

Roasted with a splash of olive oil, a twist of garlic or dash of hot chilli, aubergines are sensuously salivating. The vegetables are immediately recognisable by their iconic phallic or bulbous breast-like shape, coated in a layer of waxy, deep purple skin and tender white flesh, spongy to the touch. Narrating her own culinary heritage and nostalgic memories of plates of steaming curry, baba ghano...

In the beating heart of Berlin,  Defne Ayas  finds herself surrounded by a cast of endlessly invigorating neighbours. ‘Kiez’ is the Berliner word for a city neighbourhood, a relatively small community encompassed by the sprawling city. Originally heralding from Istanbul, but shaped by New York and Shanghai, Defne is more than at home in unfamiliar places. Sipping...

Is there any relationship more proverbial than the one between a writer and their desk? The location of laboured love, where words, dreams and fantasies flow from the tip of a pen or tap of a keyboard. Sitting down at his beloved desk, essayist Emmanuel Iduma contemplates the smooth wooden surface, his altar for creating stories. He remembers past kitchen tables, dusty library corners and even, as...

Nestled between wedge heels, cosy slippers and patent brogues on your shoe rack, there are most likely a pair of sneakers – Converse with unravelling laces, scuffed Reebok running trainers or stylish Adidas Gazelles. Discovering a pair of discarded Nikes at the back of her closet – an impulse buy off the high street – Anja Aronowsky Cronberg details how the everyday sportswear became a treasured t...

Botanical philosopher Norbert Peeters finds the lives of plants endlessly invigorating. Deep in the undergrowth of his local urban hothouse, surrounded by chirping insects and fern fronds, a gigantic inflorescence is unfurling. Colloquially known as 'the penis flower,' the 𝘈𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘱𝘩𝘰𝘱𝘩𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘶𝘴 gives off an intolerably foul scent, yet its emergence has made international headlines and attracted a sea of...

Beyond sexuality, beyond sex, beyond gender – for  Nicholas Elliott , the films of David Cronenberg are about pure transcendence, in a way that opens up the horizon to imagine a queer future. From the merging of steely chromium and pale, fishnetted thighs in Crash to fantastical dancing typewriters in Naked Lunch, Nicholas charts his love affair with the director, a romance which began during...

A hearing aid. Perhaps not the most obvious choice for an erotic item. Yet, as Fatoş Üstek finds, deep listening is essential to unlocking the full potential of our carnal selves. After all, the ears are said to be among the most sensitive of the erogenous zones. Turning her high-tech prosthetic off, Fatoş' protagonist – our sensual narrator of this auditory realm – discovers she can hear hallucin...

For the inaugural episode, curator and writer  James Taylor-Foster  explores the idea of an island. Thrusting up amidst bodies of water, these liminal spaces glimmer with possibility. Recovering from a long illness that left him bedbound for weeks, he navigates the urban island of Långholmen. Located in Sweden’s capital and known to be a historical cruising site, the rugged landscape of...