"The Lady of Little Death"

Abstract

You may enter this space not finding anything in particular to remind you of the sex act: no unmade beds, no posing bodies, no pastel lights. You have taken a dark elevator and walked into the gracious decor of one of New York City's most refined S/M houses. You encounter blue velvet-covered walls which open and close like sliding doors and regulate an ongoing traffic of clients who want to visit the different rooms: the dungeon, the medical room, the [End Page 13] classroom, Times Square, the virtual reality room, and Versailles. This last one is an ostentatious anteroom for visitors who want to initiate theater pieces in faux aristocratic environments furnished with fireplaces, marble statues, gilt frames, and brocaded thrones. Versailles casts an illusion of tactile organization and orderliness in the heart of a congested metropolis. To the uninformed outsider, the stage setup of Versailles evokes the stifling code of conduct of the upper-class. To the s/m practitioner, however, this master-servant space houses a protocol of subterfuge and erotic cruelty. 1 Looking at the variety of performances and fantasies enacted in Versailles (and its hidden dungeons) "sadomasochism" becomes a polymorphous body of sex acts which deviate from straight, genital-oriented, plotless intercourse--spanking, gagging, body piercing, urinating, infantilism, cross-dressing. The dominant and submissive partners engage in role-play and transform the bedroom ritual into a "holistic" event which purposefully moderates, and artfully interrupts, the goal of sexual intercourse and/or reproduction.