Meet Noomi, the young Russian artist behind the account @EroticWatercor. In a year, she grew a base of 150K followers on Instagram by exploring women sexual freedom and bringing an empowered vision to female sexuality. Discover her inclusive interview!
What was your journey towards erotic art?
I was always interested in eroticism – in art, cinematography, poetry and etc. the psychology of sex and how someone views sexuality, and it gradually develops with time and experience has always fascinated me. A mystery behind someone`s fetishes and destructive behaviour is my subject of investigation. And I was always into visual arts in general, I looked at different artists who explore these subjects. They inspired me for this from early ages.
Maybe the first time I thought about drawing this sort of stuff was in my teens, but I couldn’t dare really – I was raised in a very strict family and I knew they wouldn’t understand so I postponed it for the time I`d be more independent. The idea of drawing erotica never really left me, I think I was just too busy with other stuff to realise that this is the thing I actually wanted to draw.
Then just before I graduated from my uni, I had an urge to just draw something I always wanted and never done before and OH WOW! it was a porn scene from some cheap movie I came across accidentally. And I really enjoyed transforming this scene into watercolor painting – the posture of actors, the colors, details in their clothes, their facial expressions, the context – everything about it was quite interesting to draw and it felt just right. So, I continued.
When it comes to erotic art, who are the artists (author, painter, movie maker, singer. Photographer…) you look up to?
I was greatly inspired by Francis Bacon, who portrays the agony of flesh – desperate and neglected – a flesh that goes through painful transformation. That’s the sex I’m exploring in my art – destructive, weird, kinky, degrading, sensual in the particular desire to devour your partner and etc. It`s about boundaries which don’t exist – every (consensual) fantasy is manageable. The only stop-word you have is “more”. It’s especially important to emphasize this as I was brought in quite religious and strict family where a woman didn’t have a right to have her own desires or to be bisexual, homosexual. That’s why in my art, I am trying to be as rebellious as possible, I want to show that a woman can draw or be turned on by whatever she wants.
I must say that probably Japan had the greatest impact on me, as I was so inspired by their traditional/modern culture and their approach to sexuality – their feminine men and devotion to toys and general “weirdness”. Also, hentai manga was essential for me, I think I am just a product of this sort of inexhaustible source of information called internet – as a teen I could easily find any hentai I needed and watch as much porn as I wanted.
You have grown a huge number of followers on Instagram. It’s a great platform for artists but a complicated one to navigate when it comes to promoting sex positivity. I see you have created at least 2 accounts 🙂 How do you get by?
Well, I don’t really feel that’s complicated…I think it’s easy to promote sex positivity through Instagram but is hard if people report you constantly. Instagram is an open field, you can’t really hide your page from particular groups of people like underage or some morons who hate women and etc. so any person, be it an erotic artist or children’s book illustrator on IG can get deleted – but it`s like that on every social media platform really. As I’ve noticed, IG is much more loyal to erotic artists than Facebook for example, and it’s much easier to reach new audience there. I have two accounts only because my first one was deleted 5 times. And current algorithms make my initial page much less viewed than second one, because the second one has less followers, so less ghostfollowers who drag down my page, which is why I promote my products mostly via my second page.
Instagram is a great source of body positive/sex positive info because almost everybody now has their blogs on Instagram.
What do you find the most sensual in a woman?
Every aspect about a woman can be sensual, depends on a viewer. I find sensuality in every curve and soft line a woman has. Also, I really love how sometimes hair shimmer in the sun, body hair as well – they have their own beauty. The character is also very important, again sexuality is all about psychology.
Do you think mentalities are changing when it comes to women’s sexuality and the way it is perceived by society? And what can each and every one of us do to make things change?
Yes, I definitely think it changes – only ten years ago I could not have even imagined women would openly show unshaved armpits and be all positive about curves – especially in Russia, where I live. I think people just need more time to adapt and reconsider few things in their patriarchal mindset. Woman is no longer a domesticated animal – they are fighting for equality and it`s the right thing to do. Of course, the perception varies from country to country but generally, women get more rights than they had before.
Talking about female sexuality – for sure it is now perceived much better by society, women are now in charge of their own bodies – they decide if they want to have sex or with whom to have it, how many times a week and so on. There are more female orientated sex toys on the market, more rapists at power get prosecuted and judged by society. We now openly talk about menstruation and slut-shaming/victim-blaming – so it is getting better.
I think that every adequate person should stand for the freedom – freedom for everyone, cause it`s a basic right.
We all should be brave and start from ourselves – we should not close our eyes on injustice and unfair treatment on other people. We should speak up and not be silent – that`s the way we can change something in our world.
One word/One piece of advice/One question/One exclamation to our readers?
This can sound a bit cheesy but I`d just advise to stay true to your beliefs and do what you feel you want to do.
