Five artists celebrate all forms of intimacy; untethered, unabashed, and unbound. Featuring Eronin, Fernando Carpaneda, Ellen Stagg, Martina Secondo Russo and Anna Park.

Pop-Porn will debut at MF Gallery in Brooklyn on Jan. 12th, 2019. Curated by Matt Myers, aka Eronin, Pop-Porn spotlights five artists working with modern concepts of eroticism and desire, and how it is vital to us right now.

Warhol, Wesselmann and Lichtenstein drew from everyday images from mass media and popular culture to create Pop-Art. Pop-Porn also draws from mass media, but from more provocative sources.

There is an ever-growing trend in major venues and even auction houses to promote erotica as valid and mainstream. For two years in a row, Sotheby’s London has celebrated erotica in their highly successful public auctions aptly titled: ‘Erotic: Passion & Desire’, and last year the first London Erotic Festival premiered with two of the artists featured in Pop-Porn; Eronin, and Fernando Carpaneda.

Eronin has worked and shown his art at Sotheby’s NY auction house since 2001. He became keenly aware of a cross-connect between Pop-Art and Eroticism, and the idea of Pop-Porn emerged as a platform to showcase a group of artists sharing this vision. In Pop-Porn, his over life-sized watercolors of modern day Japanese porn stars in ecstasy are directly connected to traditional Japanese Shunga from a century earlier. In addition to the London show, he has shown in various other erotic themed shows in the US.

Fernando Carpaneda was a top choice for his unwavering devotion to the human figure and its inherent eroticism. His voracious engagement in the causes of diversity and punk culture led him to exhibit at Art Basel in Miami, the Tom of Finland Foundation in California, the Stax Museum of American Soul Music in Memphis, the Leslie Lohman Museum in New York and most recently a one person show at MF Gallery. His immaculate figures in Pop-Porn, writhing in ecstasy with bloody pieces of meat harken to his love of classical figures such as Michelangelo’s slaves, but thrust into Pop culture, assimilating them into an erotic Punk counterculture iconography.

Ellen Stagg, a Brooklyn-based photographer, and true multi-media entrepreneur, uses adult actresses and other exotic models to show the erotic beauty of the feminine body which she uses to empower and celebrate all types of women. Much of her art is unique and experimental, combining sensuous female figures, nature and a playful exploration of film and digital effects. Her included Polaroids harken to Andy Warhol’s own use of the medium to capture many of the famous and infamous in the Pop culture world.

Martina Secondo Russo, was born in Genoa, Italy, but has lived in New York City since she was four years old. Her art focuses on Pop-culture trends of tattoos, Pin-ups and Horror, often mixing the genres to create a dystopian look on life. In her “Bellezze Al Bagno” (“Bathing Beauties”) series, she depicts Italian movie stars from the 1950’s-70’s in iconic locations from her native region of Liguria, to create a nostalgic look into her own past. Like Wesselmann’s nudes and seashore icons, she sexualizes and romanticizes the heroines of her Italian Pop culture.

Anna Park, albeit the youngest artist of the group, is creating very edgy charcoal drawings conveying intimacy and alienation. There is a dark sinister sexiness in her work that speaks of the more lurid aspects in society but also reflects on her own personal connection. Her works remind the viewer of the photographer Weegee’s graphic black and white photos of crime scenes; they show the mundane underbelly of our Pop-culture in human and other-worldly interactions.

The artists will be in attendance at the opening on Saturday January 12th, from 7 to 10pm. Admission is free and open to audiences 18 and over. Refreshments will be served.

After opening night, the show will be open by appointment only, until February 17th, 2019.

MF Gallery is located at 213 Bond Street, between Baltic and Butler Streets in the Gowanus neighborhood of Brooklyn. Take the F or G to Bergen St., the A or C to Hoyt/ Schermerhorn, or the R to Union.

The artwork can also be viewed and purchased online at: www.mfgallery.net/PopPorn/PopPorn.html

Email info@MFgallery.net or call (917)446-8681 to schedule a visit, or for any other inquiries.