XX doesn’t want to be the one who tells his mother he’s been at it again. The first and last time many years ago she caught him masturbating they had a brief, awkward conversation.
She prescribed a diversionary therapy – sports. His Anglican priest father may have approved. XX may never know.
He grew up in a household where conversations about masturbation and sex were missing and his mother’s discovery was never again mentioned. He laments that and a lack of communication on the topic. He wants to liberate masturbation from the shackles of shame and taboo.
XX is an artist who for his latest exhibition drew with one hand while he masturbated the other. The ten works of The Masturbation Series – pen on standard white A-4 paper – hang in Hobart’s ZZZ. Hobart is where XX, a strapping 26-year-old, graduated a fine arts degree.
At least half of the series had sold so far, for about $300 each piece.
Under each image is a legend describing aspects of each work including the time, inspirational content, location, duration, and a satisfaction rating mark out of 10.
His sixth month’s work took him to the great outdoors, public toilets, on a plane, and to more homely surrounds.
His efforts occurred mostly in business hours. Imaginings ran a gamut of previous-actual and fantasised sexual encounters, Tomb Raider’s Lara Croft, and an air hostess. They were aided by pornography and sexual drawing.
The longest work took 20 minutes, the shortest was seven minutes. The lowest satisfaction rating was a 2.4 – a non-completion in bushes due to a fairy wren sighting and the sound of a young family walking in the distance. The highest rating was a 8.7, 20 minutes in a home setting involving a medley of imaginings and drawings involving an ex-girlfriend and a recent sexual encounter.
Despite putting himself “out there”, XX admits he’d rather his mother finds out about this exhibition from someone else.
“Oh my god I haven’t told her. I was hoping if she needs to find out that it won’t be me who tells her,” XX says.
XX says he’s been playing artistically with different mediums and subjects but this latest series “feels more me than anything else”.
He says he wants to promote discussion about masturbation and provoke that through his work, creating an environment where people talk about something otherwise deemed shameful, pushing past small talk on the topic.
“Usually with anything to do with sexuality there’s a sense of shame and taboo so it would be nice to be able to talk about it an open and honest way rather than put a face on it,” he says.
He wants the series to be seen as both serious in terms of his goal and humorous if it paves a way into the subject for people.
Tasmanian art collector, and owner of one of The Masturbation Series‘ works, YY says the exhibition is brave.
“I’ve got some of XX’s earlier works and he shows talent but his success will depend on application. But judging by this latest series he has a fair bit of application,” YY said.
“He’s putting himself out there with this series and he’s obviously a non-conformist or non-traditionalist in that way and it takes a lot of courage to do that.
“The piece I chose had clearer imagery. The lines were more fluid and I guess in a way more relaxed than the others.
“I’m not sure if that was indicative of what was going on at the time … and as it turned out the one I got had the greatest satisfaction rating and the longest duration – whatever that means.”
The majority of the works have a scribble like quality to them. The piece YY purchased was a deliberately erotic drawing as XX was using it for imaginings.
XX won’t do another masturbation series – “it’s been done”, he says. But he is considering moving on to a sex series and pondering the mechanic of how he could draw at the same time.
Paul Carter is a Hobart journalist.
