Turn on the red light: notes on the birth of Italian pornography

Abstract

ABSTRACT The 1960s and early 1970s definitely saw the generalized eroticization of Italian media; however, approximately from the second half of the 1970s, the sexualization of the mediascape was taken to its furthest extent, as the boundaries of explicit representation were broken and pushed from softcore towards hardcore. Through an exploration of the Italian adult press of the time and through an examination of the phenomenon of the ‘hardcore versions’ (Italian erotic films ‘pornified’ for export), this article provides a few starting points in order to draft a first (and necessarily partial) reconstruction of the stages through which pornography gained ground within the Italian cultural context during the second half of the 1970s.