Visual Archives of Sex

Book excerpt: Contributors to this special issue study the visual histories of sex by examining symbols, images, film, and other visual forms ranging from medieval religious icons to twenty-first-century selfies. They argue that engaging BIPOC, antiracist, queer, and feminist perspectives of the past is vital to understanding the complex historical relationships between sex and visual culture and how these relationships continue to shape sexual lives, bodies, myths, and desires. Essay topics include trans visual archives in Francoist Spain, a visual archive of British escort and nightclub hostess Ruth Ellis, pornography and queer pleasure in East Germany, swimsuit advertisements and "bikini blondes" in the age of the atom bomb, and teaching the history of sexuality with images. This issue also contains a roundtable on curating exhibitions devoted to sex and to queer and trans experience; conversations with historians, artists, and curators who study visual culture and the history of sexuality; and an exploration of the photographic archives of Carol Leigh, a.k.a. Scarlot Harlot. Contributors. Heike Bauer, Roland Betancourt, Alexis L. Boylan, Topher Campbell, João Florêncio, Kyle Frackman, Javier Fernández Galeano, Sarah Jones, Carol Leigh, Conor McGrady, Ben Miller, Derek Conrad Murray, Lynda Nead, Melina Pappademos, Ashkan Sepahvand, David Serlin, Meg Slater, Katie Sutton, Annette F. Timm, Jennifer Tucker, Jeanne Vaccaro, Sunny Xiang