The Spanish obscenities of Bruce LaBruce

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article examines Bruce LaBruce’s exploration of obscenity and pornography in the Spanish context, studying three of his recent Spain-based pornographic films alongside his 2012 photographic exhibition ‘Obscenity’ at the LaFresh Gallery in Madrid. By filming in Madrid and Barcelona while casting Spanish adult film actors and celebrities from popular culture for his porn and photography, LaBruce playfully toys with the boundaries separating transnational and local porn production. Through close readings of his films and photography, this article considers the cultural narratives, characters, and celebrity personas of LaBruce’s ‘Spanish’ work both within Spanish culture and transnational media. In doing so, we see how his productions challenge the form and national nature of pornography in Spain, destabilizing what might count as ‘Spanish’ or not. Such purposeful instability becomes a new sort of transnational Spanish pornography, with LaBruce’s Spanish films adhering at once to cultural and transcultural narratives even as they push against the borders of the obscene and the pornographic in Spain.