Sex on the Beach
Feminist Porn Selection at La Guarimba Film Festival

"I am convinced, like La Guarimba Film Festival, that beautiful culture makes people happy, and that everything should be done to share it. I am also convinced that sexual cultures belong to everyone, like the sea, and should be distributed, like water”, says Benedetta.

During the last Guarimba we hosted Venetian multidisciplinary artist Benedetta Panisson as part of the official jury. Out of a casual conversation came the idea of organizing a special program of feminist porn cinema together, designed to start a conversation about the artistic value of pornography and challenge the stereotypes of a traditionally macho industry. A year later, in 2023, on the night of August 11, this crazy idea came to life: we set up a screen on the beach, in a secret location that we shared with interested viewers. In front of an audience that flocked in large numbers, we shared a unique moment of community and intimacy. How good is it today to watch porn and feel that it is a feminist stimulation, as well as an arousal?

Porn until a few decades ago was held in balance in the intersection of categories such as gender, orientation, race. The three notions, in and out of porn, work together, determining minorities and marginality: the display was a product for the male, white, straight gaze. When feminism meets porn, and initially it is more of a clash, it criticizes the way gender, orientation, race are staged. Feminism thus begins to produce its own non-normative erotic-pornographic-sensual imagery, breaking the binarisms that held up classic porn. Feminist porn is a physical arousing, and cultural experience, as queer as inclusive, affecting all of us. In her introduction speech, Benedetta shared some questions to the audience:

1. Why are we on a beach by night, in a secret location?
2. Following question: Are we marginal?
3. Do you hide when you watch porn?
4. Do you share your favourite porn with your friends, lovers, family, sons and daughters?
6. Is porn still in the nexus of prohibitions and moral structures?
7. What should porn be in a society without religion?
8. Is feminist porn for female, male or non binary gaze?
9. What sexual practices are feminist? Is penetration feminist? Is anal sex feminist? Is oral sex feminist?
10. Is pleasure just always socially, economically, politically constructed?
12. Is consensuality transgressive?
13. Is inclusivity erotic?

and, the last one:
When in front of a porn, does our physical arousal coincide with our intellectual arousal?

After warming up with the Feminist Porn program, Afro-Caribbean music was unleashed on Amantea Beach with Dayana Chaparro Garcia, aka Guayaba, an interdisciplinary artist and activist from Colombia. Her set combined Afro-Caribbean sounds, cumbia, champeta, salsa and guaracha, contaminated with electronic, psychedelic and wild rhythms from multiple underground scenes.

https://www.laguarimba.com/it/edizione2023/