Porn?

Porn is not dead, but it's not feeling itself either. The quantity of pornography being consumed is greater than ever, but what was once disguised by a brown paper bag is now the subject of mainstream movies and the subtext of global news stories.Somewhere between the explicit revelations about President Clinton's sex life and the making of The People vs Larry Flynt, dirt lost much of its ability to stain, leaving something of a cultural vacuum in the process. Provocative questions about sexual imagery and the sex industry in the Western world have now been explored by an idea storm in the form of a groundbreaking book: "Porn?"The concept of cutting-edge British monthly Dazed & Confused, and art directed by award-winning Tom Hingston Studio, "Porn?" brings together a sexually balanced orgy of the world's top fashion, art and documentary photographers, illustrators and writers, filling a space between low-brow porn and high art erotica. Sensual images mix with absurd and provocative conceits: Nick Knight's covert hand wanks furiously under a cover; Paul M Smith creates hybrid creatures from the the features and bodies of porn stars; Larry Sultan documents the empty sets and flimsy props that form the background of California's porn film industry; Terry Richardson shoots the most famous porn star of all, Houston of Houston 500 fame. From studies of sex aids to the succulent surfaces of meat, "Porn"?'s razor-sharp design acts as a prism for the concept of pornography, deconstructing the industrialised voyeurism of ailing medium-core and turning it into something far more stimulating.