Art and pornography : philosophical essays / edited by Hans Maes and Jerrold Levinson.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Introduction / Hans Maes and Jerrold Levinson -- 1. Pornography, erotica, and art -- Who says pornography can't be art? / Hans Maes -- The pornographic, the erotic, the charming, and the sublime / Alex Neill -- Pornography, art, and the intended response of the receiver / David Davies -- Is pornographic art comparable to religious art? / Jerrold Levinson -- 2. Pornography, imagination, and fiction -- Imagination, fantasy, and sexual desire / Cain Todd -- Pornography and imagining about oneself / Kathleen Stock -- Pornography at the edge: depiction, fiction, and sexual predilection / Christy Mag Uidhir and Henry John Pratt -- 3. Pornography, medium, and genre -- Why do porn films suck? / Petra van Brabandt and Jesse Prinz -- Anti-pornography: André Kertész's Distortions / Bence Nanay -- An aesthetics of transgressive pornography / Michael Newall -- 4. Pornography, ethics, and feminism -- On the ethical distinction between art and pornography / Brandon Cooke -- Concepts of pornography: aesthetics, feminism, and methodology / Andrew Kania -- What's wrong with the (female) nude? : a feminist perspective on art and pornography / A. W. Eaton -- Taking a moral perspective: on voyeurism in art / Elisabeth Schellekens.

This book presents a series of essays which investigate the artistic status and aesthetic dimension of pornographic pictures, films, and literature, and explores the distinction, if there is any, between pornography and erotic art. Is there any overlap between art and pornography, or are the two mutually exclusive? If they are, why is that? If they are not, how might we characterize pornographic art or artistic pornography, and how might pornographic art be distinguished, if at all, from erotic art? Can there be aesthetic experience of pornography? What are some of the psychological, social, and political consequences of the creation and appreciation of erotic art or artistic pornography? Leading scholars from around the world address these questions, and more, and bring together different aesthetic perspectives and approaches to this widely consumed, increasingly visible, yet aesthetically underexplored cultural domain.