What’s new
More evil intent
4th June 2026
There’s something about Baudelaire’s Les Fleurs du Mal (The Flowers of Evil) that has inspired many artists’ most remarkable work, and today we bring you Alméry Lobel-Riche’s compelling and very personal 1923 portfolio of engravings. See it now by clicking here.
The censor in the studio
1st June 2026
In the past, when we’ve been discussing the censorship of erotic art we’ve usually been referring to suppression after the fact – a book banned, a print seized, a painting removed from display. The work already existed; the argument was about whether the public should be allowed to see it. But… read more
A new navigation tool
31st May 2026
We’ve now worked out how to refine our new ‘Similar artists’ feature so it’s really useful. We’ve only done the artists beginning with A so far, but will be working through all the artist biographies as fast as possible. Check it out (the one for Victor Adam for example is here), and let us know what you think.
A woman in a man’s body
30th May 2026
In 1929 a trilogy of cheap paperbacks was published in Paris telling the story of young ‘inverti’ Fredi – ‘a woman in a man’s body’. The mixture of voyeurism, curiosity and sympathy was characteristic of much interwar homosexual literature. Illustrated by the ubiquitous ‘Gaston Smit’, you can read all about Fredi by clicking here.
Secret songs
28th May 2026
Pierre Louÿs’ mock-Greek lesbian Songs of Bilitis were so successful that after his death in 1925 the more explicit ‘secret songs’ were hot properties. Read all about how they came to light, and see Paul-Émile Bécat’s equally explicit etchings, by clicking here.
Une imagination extraordinaire
26th May 2026
You’ll no doubt be aware just how many of the erotic works of Pierre Louÿs appear as illustrated versions on the site; we’ve now translated Jean-Paul Goujon’s introduction to the complete Louÿs Œuvre Érotique, which you can read in our Themes and Topics section by clicking here. What a remarkable pioneer Louÿs was!
A Bécat rarity
23rd May 2026
A couple of months ago we asked if any of you had a copy of the ultra-rare 1959 Paul-Émile Bécat-illustrated Les Fleurs du Mal. Then remarkably we found a copy in a New York gay bookshop – and discovered the likely reason why it is so rare. Read all about it by clicking here.
The great honesterotica feedback questionnaire
22nd May 2026
The results are in! Thank you all so much for taking the time to respond, and in many cases in such detail. It really does give us a clear idea of who you are, how you use the website, what you like and value about it – and importantly how we can help make your experience of the site even better.… read moreImportant recent updates
✨ Illustrator and portfolio lists
One of the most common requests we get (and the responses to the recent questionnaire confirm this) is that it would be really useful to have complete listings of all the artists and portfolios on the website – as of May 2026 728 artists and 2,003 portfolios!
So we’ve listened and heard … and by following this link you will find files with these listings in alphabetical order (and where there are several portfolios with the same name their artists will be in order too). The lists are in PDF format, so you can download, save and search them. They duplicate what you can already find in the artist and portfolio listings on the website, but if you’re really into erotic art and illustration and would like a quick ready reference, you should find these invaluable. Enjoy!
✨ Helping you to find your way around
You asked for it, we’ve done it – all the artists on the site now have a set of ‘Similar artists’ links at the end of their biography, so whether it’s bookplate artists, spanking artists, gay artists, whatever, you can cruise easily from artist to similar artist. Have fun!
✨ Hans-Jürgen Döpp, 1940–2025
Few people have shared their wisdom, experience – and wonderful collection of erotic art – more than Hans-Jürgen Döpp, who sadly died last year at the age of 84. For more than half a century Hans-Jürgen devoted himself to the study and collection of erotic art, not as a marginal curiosity or a private indulgence, but as an essential part of human culture. Through his work as a scholar, teacher, curator, author and collector, he helped establish erotic art as a serious field of artistic and historical enquiry. He was an enthusiastic supporter of honesterotica, sharing more than 200 of his portfolios with us, helping to make the website a unique resource of erotic art that would otherwise have been lost to the world. Read our tribute to Hans-Jürgen here.
✨ The difficult mirror
Artists, childhood, and the challenge of looking
At a time of growing concern about online child safety, we are very aware of how we handle the sensitive subject of depictions of children in art, especially ‘erotic art’. We have added an important Themes and Topics article here, which helps explore how artists over time have depicted naked children, and why it is as important to think seriously about what art is for and how we look at and experience it as about what is actually being depicted. Read the piece and see what you think.