Review

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Sex worker art show is both raw and well-done

By Larry Knowles

February 20, 2006

La Jolla, CA--Rarely do you run into a woman who refers to herself as a whore and her vagina as a pussy. Rarer still is the woman who talks this way outside of the throes of ecstasy or a warehouse in the San Fernando Valley. And rarest of all is the female who says these things while standing stark naked in front of a few hundred people in a college campus auditorium.

However, if you’d attended the Sex Workers Art Show, a Vaudevillian road show of former (and present) sex workers, when it flashed the goods at the University of California, San Diego last week, you would have gotten an earful and eyeful of women talking like truckers and gyrating like Jezebels for all the campus to see.

It was just a synonym for vagina, an anatomical reference rather than a sexual one. Those damn sex workers sullied a good word and it took hours before I could think of pussy with any lust or infatuation.

As for the performances, they ran the gamut, from burlesque (well done) and web cam brooding (half-baked), to exhibitionism (raw).

The Scarlot Harlot, a rubenesque prostitute and elder stateswoman of the sex workers rights movement, performed a whimsical burlesque. Her piece began when she interrupted emcee Annie Oakley and stormed down the auditorium aisle barking anti-ho hooey. She then ambled up on stage and took the audience through a whirlwind PowerPoint presentation that decried the world’s oldest profession. Afterwards, she wiped her brow and commented how hot it was in the auditorium. She took off her hat and shawl. Then her jacket and blouse, and, well,….you know the rest.

Web cam diva Ana Voog of www.anacam.com fame performed remotely (literally and figuratively) from somewhere in Minnesota. Images of a pale-faced, mustachioed Ana rotated every twenty seconds on a large screen to harried snippets of Ana’s fragile voice. The piece was shockingly bland. I’m not sure what the moustache was about, and ten minutes of brooding didn’t do much for me. There was no nudity or irony, and if there was a message in the piece, I missed it.

Bridget Irish and Julie Muz, however, followed with over the top, bare-all performances that sent a few patrons heading for the exits.

First, Irish, nude and blindfolded, was escorted on stage by an S&M manservant and left alone. Irish removed her blindfold and squinted out at us. The auditorium was silent. Then she picked up an envelope at her feet, ripped it open, and removed two items: eye glasses and a watch. After she put on the items, the Mission Impossible theme broke out over the P.A. system.

Irish, in the buff, leapt from the stage and sprinted up the aisle. As the music continued, she cut hard into a row, clamoring over and around startled patrons. Unwitting UCSD students suddenly found themselves pushed back in their seats by a bolt of T&A, muff and labia.

Irish reached beneath an audience member, grabbed an envelope, and raced back on stage. She tore open the envelope and found…a pair of socks. After donning the socks—mind you, she’s wearing only socks, glasses, and a wristwatch—she darted back into the audience to find another envelope. Eight or ten envelopes later, she managed to have enough articles of clothing to rejoin society.

The piece wasn’t for everyone. Four of five people walked out during and after the performance. I liked it for two reasons, though. I’m not offended by nudity and it had artistic merit. I empathized with Irish as she stood on stage blind, completely naked, and in front of complete strangers. She lived out an anxiety dream that most of us have had, and came out okay.

Then came Julie Muz, who made Irish’s bit look tame.

Earlier, Muz had performed a solo routine where she escaped from bondage and flipped off the audience. So, the audience was forewarned.

Muz took the stage and quickly stripped to a song with the refrain “Breaking the law! Breaking the law!”

She then gave new meaning to the term “lip synching.”

Completely naked, Muz turned her back to the audience and bent over. Pulling her ass cheeks apart in concert with the lyrics, she butt-synched “Breaking the law! Breaking the law!”

Breaking the law! Breaking the law!

A minute later, she turned around, thrust her pelvis outward, and clutched her labia majora. “Breaking the law! Breaking the law!” she sang, opening and closing her pussy lips.

Pussy—the word, the organ—had been completely and utterly demystified. And I’d become completely and utterly desensitized. I’m not sure if that’s a good thing.