Gabriel Samuels takes a peep at monster dildos and other accessories at a sex fest in London Fields.
I’ve only been in Sex Shop for a couple of minutes, and it’s already making me wince.
I walk over to one table and leaf through the pages of a lengthy contract, positioned alongside a huge black horse dildo and a hand-painted ceramic clitoris.
It’s a “legally binding” sexual contract – very Fifty Shades, you might say. But with written conditions granting the most depraved of sex acts – erotophonophilia, and figging and felching (I’ll leave you to Google those ones…) – it’s one that would make even Christian Grey blush.
Other goodies on offer here include a 3D-printed scaled-up model of a bean weevil’s penis and a deeply disturbing statuette of a girl with fifteen breasts.
Fifty UK artists and designers were commissioned by the Sex Shop curators to delve into the most perverse corners of their minds and create their own fetish object prototype – and they went all out.
More satirical than saucy
It’s a Friday lunchtime and I’m here gazing at the fruits of their labour inside a room on a council estate south of London Fields. The windows are covered with pink blinds that lend it a shady, seedy feel. You might even imagine you’re somewhere in Soho, back when people thought it was cool.
Given this is meant to be ‘Art’, most of these works aren’t particularly arousing – a Dr. John Dee-inspired occult Dark Mirror strictly reserved for voyeurs sits alongside a graphic novel exploring the absurdity of sex terminology, and a hand-crafted ‘bondage tea-towel’.
They’re more satirical than saucy – a bizarre retro-styled ‘N.S.A Sex Bomb’ poster fills one wall and a prototype ‘spray-on condom’ bottle has its own plinth.
And it’s unashamedly audio-visual too: dare to put on a pair of headphones and you’ll overhear a young woman describe in detail how breathing during meditation gets her off.
So why Hackney, and why now? “Hackney’s such a design conscious, sexual place we think.” says Cathy Lomax, director of Transition Gallery. “This show was over in Folkestone last year so they got the whole seedy seaside vibe, but we think Hackney has just as much to offer in terms of shaking things up in the bedroom.”
Unwelcome visitors ‘a bit embarassed’
I explain how it took me twenty minutes to find the exhibit at all from the outside.
“Yeah we don’t advertise outside really, internet reviews are all that bring people in” says Cathy.
“But we like that you have to know about it to be able to find it – it’s not elitist, it’s just intimate.”
With a name like Sex Shop, the gallery has already had a couple of confused and unwelcome visitors.
“We’ve had a few people coming in asking for dildos and Fleshlights already, and it’s only been open a week,” sighs Cathy. “They’re a bit embarrassed when they realise it’s just art.”
Instead of focusing on the mere visual allure of sexuality, Sex Shop penetrates deep beneath the surface to explore the darker side of the erotic.
It’s sex, but not as we know it.
Part One of ‘Sex Shop’ is now open at Transition Gallery, Unit 25a Regent Studios, 8 Andrews Road, E8 4QN. Part Two, with 25 new exhibits, opens on Sunday March 15.
The accompanying sex edition of ‘Garageland’ Magazine will be released on Sunday March 29, and is available in galleries across London.
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