LOS ANGELES — Jennifer Lyon Bell was recently awarded the Sex & Media Prize 2019 from the Dutch Scientific Association for Sexology (NVVS) for her film, "Adorn," making it the first-ever adult film to win the prize.
Every year, the Sex & Media Prize is awarded to a media project deemed by the NVVS to have had the most positive effect on public attitudes about sexuality.
With regards to "Adorn," this year's jury panel noted that they felt it to be "innovative, interesting and informative, with just the right dose of realistic messages about sex."
"The key elements that most of this year’s submissions hoped to convey are right here in the winning film," they continued, "the importance of touch and that sex is so much more than just arousing the genitals.”
Presented as an improvised "erotic game," Bell shared, "With 'Adorn,' I wanted to make a film that captures something I think is very important about sex: the emotional presence of two people trying to discover together what will make them mutually happy.
"My idea was to do this with the constraints of an unusual erotic game," she explained. "'Adorn' would start with both performers naked, and have one rule: you are only allowed to touch the other person over or under clothing that you put on them. So the actors couldn’t rely on the 'typical' order of heteronormative sex acts, because it wasn’t allowed! They would need to get creative. I’m so happy that it worked — they really listened to one another and did things together sexually that I have honestly never seen before.
"The trust between them created more emotion than I could have anticipated. It’s funny and rough and loving. I am very proud of what we made out of their experience."
Accepting the award, Bell thanked the crew and stars Sadie Lune and Parker Marx, further addressing the audience of sexologists to say, "For those of you perplexed as to why a porn film is winning a sexology award, I understand," while contextualizing porn as a continued component of lifelong sexual education.
"There will never be a substitute for what I know many of you are working towards," Bell said, "thorough and useful sexual education for not just young people, but people of all ages. That is extremely important. It is wrong and unfair that the entertainment we call porn should be forced to fill that role by itself. But while we are working on creating that better world of sex education, I hope that we can create a better cultural dialogue around understanding porn, by allowing that looking at sex via film can be pleasurable for people, and that pleasure can be fundamentally good.
"Maybe we call it porn, maybe we call it erotic film, maybe it is mixed with art — or maybe it is not. But let us critique based on the facts and the realities, not on labels and prejudice.”
The full text of her speech is available here.
"Adorn" is exclusively available for streaming or download via Blue Artichoke Films.
