Performer and writer Wendy Delorme, a semi-naked blonde styled as a screen pin-up, is pouting and posing for the camera. After discovering an apple, she spends a few minutes erotically contemplating it to a back drop of ethereal break beats, choppy editing and nostalgic lighting. Finally she pushes the fruit into her vagina. The potent film, a thematic mix of pornography, fetish and burlesque, ends with a shot of her biting into the fruit.

This take on the Adam and Eve story is the work of French filmmaker and photographer Emilie Jouvet and, she says, it’s the work she’s most proud of. The arty short came two years after Jouvet filmed France’s first pornography by lesbians, for lesbians. One Night Stand (2006) – like her photography – is grounded in reality, using the lives of her friends in Paris who have real sex, in real time. ‘It was very difficult at the beginning to find actresses,’ she says. ‘Many girls were afraid to show their own sexuality as they thought it would be to the benefit of men. But I wanted to make something fun, colourful, very hot, and with a lot of different [kinds of] sexual practises and bodies.’ From the work of trans photographer Kael T Block to the new monthly sessions organised by filmmaker Florence Fradelizzi for female porn purveyors, it seems Paris is experiencing a kind of revolution, with the help of Jouvet. ‘I’m very happy about it,’ says Jouvet. ‘The alternative sex scene here is growing.’

Like the progressive expression emerging from France, Spain is also witnessing a sea change that is taking alternative visual sex to a new level. Beatriz Preciado, a theorist and writer who organises ‘postporn’ events, says: ‘I realised that what was happening in Spain and the Basque country was really interesting. The representation of the body and sexuality has become a central issue for artists and activists since the 80s… maybe it was because we had just come out of 50 years of dictatorship. At the first PostPorn Marathon [event at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Barcelona, 2003], I was surprised by the amount and quality of young artists working on queer porn.’
Out of that event came an array of new ideas from the likes of performance artist Diana Pornoterristo – her name says it all – who is currently working with Italian group VideoArmsIdea, and Post-Op, a duo who are about to release their first feature-length porn film. The collective seems to be part of a movement that, rather than using mainstream burlesque and pornography as starting points, is inspired by punk, anarchist and even manga subcultures – with a sense of guerrilla performativity thrown in.
‘We would like to see porno that is closer to our desires and our bodies,’ Elena and Majo, from Post-Op, say. ‘A porno that has a critical perspective towards mainstream pornography and that proposes a vision closer to our interests – and, of course, one that makes us horny.’ Post-Op organise workshops that embody their grassroots ideals. ‘We try to bring out the queer porn star in us, making people feel comfortable while being filmed or photographed doing things they consider pornographic.’ At the end of each workshop Elena and Majo offer the participants their first porn magazine or footage featuring their performances. The idea is that they will end up producing their own pornography for themselves.
Burgeoning though it is, inclusive (as opposed to male-targeted) pornography is still a niche industry in most of Europe. However, in Sweden it is not just possible to obtain public space, but state support. Mia Engberg, a filmmaker whose company Sexy Film distributes and produces queer and alternative movies for women who want more, counts Del LaGrace Volcano and San Francisco’s Frameline film festival as inspirations.
Her current project, a short film compilation entitled Dirty Diaries, is funded by the Swedish Film Institute and aspires to be ‘a feminist project aiming to make queer, quality erotica based on the female gaze.’ Shot on mobile phone cameras, the work easily found funding in the Scandinavian country known for its liberal social ventures. ‘There is not much going on in the alternative sex scene in Sweden, and the SFI is interested in feminist, cutting-edge projects,’ Engberg explains. Dirty Diaries will include both queer and ‘straight’ stories, the common ground being the female perspective.
Engberg’s filmography explores diverse subjects, from transsexuals to squatters, skinheads to lesbians. Selma & Sofie – a lesbian porno set in a leisure centre – and Bitch & Butch both reflect one reviewer’s high praise: ‘Engberg is not satisfied until she has crushed both capitalism and gender oppression. And she wants you to have better sex.’
German filmmaker Julia Ostertag produces what she calls ‘transgressive’ work, using actors with ambiguous sexual identities performed in abandoned industrial spaces and ruined landscapes that would not be out of place in a Derek Jarman film. Though Ostertag’s work is queer in the sense of its focus on androgyny and the fleeting moments of gender fluidity, her work isn’t strictly for gay girls. But unlike some of the usual trashy shorts coming out of Berlin, her films are a bit more self-reflective, dealing straightforwardly with the power relations in heterosexual sex – although it would be wrong to describe it as simply straight porn. Self-destruction, ownership, desire and love are all questioned, exposed, and even obliquely celebrated in scenes featuring couples and group sex that are often abstract, anonymous, and bleak. As well as films such as SexJunkie and Not That Kind of Girl (the latter described as ‘riot grrrl revenge porn’), her work also extends to documentary. Gender X, a film exploring the city’s transgender community, has won awards at the Berlin Porn Film Festival. ‘I can see my work as part of a female tradition,’ Ostertag says. ‘I’m inspired by performance artists like Marina Abramowicz, Birgit Hein, Kathy Acker and Carolee Schneemann. I was so fed up by the way sex is shown in both mainstream film and mainstream porn that I decided to create my own erotic imagery with the means I had – including my own body and sexual partners. As Annie Sprinkle says: “If you don’t like porn, shoot your own!”’
No matter where these ladies are from, or how their work reflects the dynamics of their sexual identities and their dreams as filmmakers and activists, they all seem to want the same thing – a creative and open visual platform for sex that pushes the traditional format of prescribed pleasure.
Emilie Jouvet’s forthcoming film, Paris to Berlin, is a road movie, featuring a group of nine lesbians, transboys, ‘gouines’ (dykes), queers, butches and femmes. Post-Op’s highly anticipated new feature and Ostertag’s ongoing work for German porn companies aims to drag a subcultural attitude into the mainstream. And countless others around Europe are attempting to create what they want to see for themselves in the porn market.
‘I think we are in the beginning of a new era, where a lot of new queer, feminist porn will be produced by filmmakers who are in it for the art of good filmmaking, not primarily to make money on other people’s needs,’ Mia Engberg says. ‘At least, I hope so.’