HAVANA — A recent pop-up art exhibit featuring handcrafted dildos has broken new ground in Cuba, prompting renewed calls for the government to legalize the sale of pleasure devices.
The trio of Cuban artist-activists behind the project — Javier Alejandro Bobadilla, Joan Díaz and Yanahara Mauri — were surprised to learn their provocative proposal had been accepted by the state-run Havana Biennial exhibition.
“While Cubans pride themselves on being very sexually liberal, many are close-minded regarding sex toys, with men in particular assuming dildos or vibrators are only for homosexuals and feeling threatened by them,” the artists told Sarah Marsh for Reuters news agency.
A scarcity of resources meant the artists were forced to scrounge for materials to create dozens of “translucent ‘phallic sculptures’ in an array of colors from pink to green, some containing wordplay on official Cuban slogans like ‘Until Victory, Always.’”
The sculptures were intended to serve as actual pleasure devices and as conversation-starters. Most of the nearly 500 objects used in the exhibit were “sold or gifted to friends and art critics,” prompting commissions for more of them, and highlighting the eager market in Cuba for legal sex toys.
However, the distribution of "anything deemed obscene is banned in the Communist-run country, and there are no sex shops or licenses available to workers in the fledgling private sector to sell sex toys," notes the Reuters profile. "Instead, Cubans import toys in their suitcases and sell them in secret."
For the artists to continue producing the phalluses, and sell them commercially, they would need the government to rule the endeavor as not specifically obscene. “News of their work has re-ignited calls for the state to officially authorize the sales of sex toys,” Reuters said.
