10th Anniversary Seattle Erotic Art Festival Celebrating “10 Years of Love and Lust”, June 16-24, 2012

“This will be the Festival’s biggest and best year yet,” says Festival Director Clayton Hibbert. This year the Festival is expanding from a one weekend event into a 10-day destination event. Not only will the Festival be open longer and offer more satellite events than ever before, it is also part of the Fremont Fair the first weekend, and Seattle Pride the second weekend.

Visual Art
The Festival is presenting more than 260 pieces by visual artists from across the nation and world. The exhibition showcases stunning explorations of eroticism through painting, drawing, photography, mixed media, sculptures, stained glass and more.

The 2012 visual art jurors include Dan Savage, author, media pundit, sex advice columnist of Savage Love, and co-founder of the nationally recognized It Gets Better Project and Ellen Forney, celebrated cartoonist and frequent Festival artist.

Additionally, this year the Festival is unveiling its highest honor — the Masters of Erotic Art. Five artists have been selected for this ongoing “hall of fame” to recognize those who have made meaningful contributions to the history of erotic art. The 2012 Masters of Erotic Art are Barbara Nitke, Betty Dodson, Charles Gatewood, David Steinberg and Michael Rosen.

Installation Art
This year the Festival is showcasing larger installations than ever before. The centerpiece installation – Le Petit Piège by Kevin MacDonald – is an immense steel-cable spider web (40’ wide by 20’ high), with accelerometer-driven LEDs that illuminate in response to touch.

“The spider web is a gorgeous piece of art in its own right, and additionally serves as a vertical performance stage for specially curated bondage acts and mesmerizing aerial performances,” says Hibbert. “It is the first thing attendees will see when they walk in, and they will be stunned.”

In honor of Seattle Pride, the Festival is featuring HomoPhotoArt: A Sixty Year rEvolution by Jim Wilkinson, which demonstrates the history of gay erotic art.

Performance
The main stage show will again be directed by internationally acclaimed performer, writer and director David Crellin aka Armitage Shanks (Circus Contraption co-founder). The production, titled Everything in Between, features world-renowned stars including headliner Tigger! and Canadian musical comedy duo, The Wet Spots.

Short Film
For the second year, the Festival offers short film programs curated by Three Dollar Bill Cinema, producer of The Seattle Lesbian and Gay Film Festival.  This year there will be three unique programs, including one specially designed to celebrate Seattle Pride.

Event Details
The 10th annual Festival is June 16-24, 2012. The Festival is open at Fremont Studios on both weekends June 16-17 and June 22-24, at 155 N. 35th St. There are off-site events held during the week in between.

The Festival is open to anyone 18 years old or older.

Festival tickets are on sale now.

For additional information about the Festival, please visit SeattleErotic.org or email info@SeattleErotic.org.