Art Trade: Sampson (And thoughts on sexiness)

This is a public post

Artist-tier patrons and up, you may look forward to the high res of this on your respective tier, including some detail shots and notes on the process!

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Hello, Patrons et al! Today I am happy to share with you another one of my art trades—a swapping of images with artists whose work I enjoy—as a means to connect with the social parts of the furry fandom I've neglected. When I do more obviously erotic work of this nature, I tend to feel more comfortable if an artist statement is included somewhere public. This comes from my being a recovering sex-addict: I'm not interested in facilitating unhealthy behaviours by removing substance from erotic imagery. Despite the lack of frontal nudity in this piece, I figured it deserved some unpacking.

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This may sound silly from someone who's been in the fandom as long as I have: but cis-gay kink culture is so exotic to me. It's wild seeing ornamental and performative sexual cultures outside of a paysite, magazine, or scrambled cable channel. Despite my origins of sexual repression, a lot of what's in this image I've never been exposed to firsthand. I've never seen an exotic dancer, never seen a stranger wearing donning only minimal fetish gear, and while I've once been in the vicinity of a public sex party, I was content staying at the cuddle party next-door.

Sampson, the artist I did a trade with, has been someone whose work I've enjoyed for years now, and he's been a patron of mine for just as long. When I asked Sampson what the utility of sex meant to him, I discovered we have plenty of overlap. Most notably, the utility of sexiness versus an implicitly sexual action—to be willingly objectified while enjoying yourself, in contrast to a private and focused interaction with your partner(s). There's an electricity that comes with a shared sexual attraction, something that wasn't introduced by anything more than physical appearance.

Art trades of a sexual nature have a similar kind of electricity to them. It feels like an extra layer of emotion on top of the normal entertainment of art with friends. It also feels differently based on how close I am to the other artist, if I find them attractive IRL, etc…. It's a nice intersecting point of flirtation and creation that one easily finds in the furry fandom. Despite the ease, this all still feels very new to me.

With any art I publish, I want to keep in mind consequences. It's good to consider what message I send with it, what the likelihood is of any person using the art any number of ways. This art isn't all that sexually explicit, but it still has a direct and overtly kind of sexual sentiment to it that is relevant to my interests yet rare in my current art offerings. I hope the greater context allows you, dear reader, to reflect on what your ideal kind of attraction is, and what sort of confidence you'd want to exude, public or otherwise.

Thanks again to Sampson for the kindness of accepting this trade, and for being a long-time supporter of mine. And thanks to you for taking the time to read and reflect on my thoughts.


Yours,

-J

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