Fetish Focus showcases the work of creatives around the globe and highlight how fetish has inspired them. With the help of Recon member BlackBoot11, we're providing a platform for artists to highlight how fetish has inspired and influenced them – celebrating what it is that gets you thinking and what gets you off.
Recon member spurvbcn by BlackBoot11
The _spurv project is an artistic sexual playground for gay men who love fetishes of all kinds. It's a type of erotica with an artistic touch, where fetish, sex and imagination meet to create simple, strong and powerful images.
This is one man's journey through sexuality and embracing, exploring as well as fulfilling his fantasies and later documenting them on paper as his art. His images featured here are made by using the technique of printing called blockprints or linocuts.
Linocut is a type of print that was favoured by both Matisse and Picasso. It is made by hand carving an image into a piece of linoleum, inking it and pressing it onto a paper. _spurv choses this particular technique because he likes the contradiction between the old technique and the contemporary sexual topics. He draws from both his real time experiences and oversexed imagination for subjects to print.
BB: What brought you to this specific artistic process?
_spurv: Well, I like this technique very much. The feel is much more personal for me, as I have to carve out the wood to create the image. I feel that this process gives my artwork an increased feel of hands on intimacy just as I like to be with my partners. But here with the linocuts you must think in the reverse logic of drawing - carving out the areas that will remain white in the print and leaving only what will take the ink to print on the paper. So, you are making a reverse of the original drawing.
BB: Where or how did you learn this process of printing?
_spurv: Even though I did a lot of drawing and design in university, I actually learned wood & linocut from watching YouTube videos. The many things that you can find on the internet these days...LOL !
BB: This process has been around for quite a long time, right?
_spurv: Yes definitely, plus I LOVE the contrast between a very old technique and my naughty subjects. When I make my prints, specifically in a 2 colour version, it means that I do reduction linocut - cutting the block another time to print the second colour. Similar to working on that second date to finish up what you started on the first one. That means that I lose completely the original drawing that I made on the plate, so there is no possibility ever to print this same likeness again. Actually, I love these the most, but is a lot more work and you must do it all perfectly because when you apply the last ink...you can easily mess it all up. At this point you really can't do anything more than to accept that you have a few less copies than you originally intended to print.
It's very much like the guy that sheds his weekday persona on Friday night and totally transforms himself by adding on layers of his fetish gear, transforming himself to fully enjoy the bars or circuit parties on the weekend. I feel that the virgin uncut linoblock is similar to that regular office guy at the end of the week, waiting to strip away everything that is holding him back and let his inner fetish freak run free. It's all there just underneath the surface, you just have to make the right cuts to bring it all out.
BB: So, you really enjoy cutting out these sexy fetish scenes with your tools?
_spurv: Oh yes, I am very good with my hands both with my art and my men. The act of carving out the wood and shaping it, I sometimes break out in a sweat preparing the surface to take the ink for the printing. For me, this is the most intimate process - even more than first drawing the figures on the plate.
BB: Now splitting his time between Copenhagen and Barcleona, he says his plan is to focus on creating more _spurv art works and hopefully follow in the footsteps of Tom of Finland, with his sights set on the possibility of being known as _spurv from Denmark.
If you're interested in or want to recommend a fetish and kink-based artist to be featured on Recon, please send your ideas along with a link to: social@recon.com with the subject: Fetish Focus.
