Kunsthaus Zürich is presenting the broad retrospective The Wild Swiss of Swiss-born artist Henry Füssli (1741-1825) - an exhibition worth visiting - not only because of what I'm telling you here:
In a corner of the show, I discovered some pictures of what I would, imho, describe as threesomes drawn in a pornographic manner. But they were not labeled as threesome drawn in a pornographic manner but as Symplegma.
I've never heard of this term and it took me quite some research to find anything at all about it. It seems to be Greek and means literally entanglements, referring usually to the "wrestling" Satyrs and Maenads popular in Hellenistic statuary groups.
Satyrs and Maenads were the male and female worshippers of Dionysus, the Greek god of mystery, wine and intoxication. We are talking here about indulging in copious amounts of violence, bloodletting, sex, self-intoxication and mutilation. This sounds really like much more fun than a simple threesome.
1 comment:
For me it was simply pornographie with a greek name, a mythological touch and interesting to look at. Very risky as drawing for the 18th century. Gatín
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