This Artist's NSFW Portraits Aim to Take Down the Double Standard of Oral Sex in Pop Culture

Because you've always wondered what Drake looks like when he's giving lip service.

21 March, 2018

This Artist's NSFW Portraits Aim to Take Down the Double Standard of Oral Sex in Pop Culture

It's no secret that cunnilingus is woefully underrepresented in film and pop culture. Ryan Gosling very famously made a speech in 2010 when the Motion Picture Association of America tried to give Blue Valentine an NC-17 rating because of a scene in which he was performing oral sex on Michelle Williams's character. He argued it was misogynistic for the MPAA to try and "control a woman's sexual presentation of self."

Yet these unfair double standards persist, thereby continuing to send the message that female sexual pleasure is still somehow more scandalous to viewers.

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Enter artist Alexandra Rubinstein and her incredible series, A Dream Come True. Born in Ekaterinburg, Russia, 28-year-old Rubinstein has been living in America for the last 20 years creating work that turns the long-fraught oral sex paradigm upside down.

She now lives and works in Brooklyn, New York, where she paints artwork inspired by her experience of finding her identity as a woman, while encompassing broader ideas of culture, gender, and intimacy.

"[This series] was a response to the lack of heterosexual female perspective in representation of sexuality in mainstream media and pornography ... which reiterates to the viewer that sex is about men and their pleasure. It's not!" Rubinstein told Cosmopolitan.com.

Given that many heterosexual women tend to think about specific male celebrities in their sexual fantasies, Rubinstein included popular celebrities when conceiving each piece in A Dream Come True.

"I wanted to explore fantasy from women's point of view, which usually includes Jon Hamm and cunnilingus. At least for me," she joked. Rubinstein hopes to have prints of her work available soon and you can check her website for more details. You can also buy one of her "Pussy Power" shirts just in time for Election Day.