Sex workers in art show

Combine a peep-show queen, enough hookers to satisfy the bad-boy-era Charlie Sheen, a crate of sex toys, and monologues that would make Larry Flynt blush, and you get.... Arrested? "Oooh, not bad," said a laughing Scarlot Harlot, one of the performers in the Sex Workers Art Show. "I think you can get on the tour. What else do you do, honey?" W-e-l-l ... Harlot has worked as a performer, an activist, a talk-show perennial, a visual artist, a film documentarian, and a published author. It was Harlot (real name Carol Leigh) who coined the term "sex work" back in the radical 1970s. "I don`t care who you are, or what you do, or who you do it with - sex is work," Harlot said. "At least if you are doing it right. That doesn`t mean it isn`t enjoyable. It just means you always have to work if you want to do something right." The Sex Workers Art Show, arriving at PS 211 on Tuesday, is a mix of burlesque, comedy, readings, film, sketches and a smattering of sculpture, prints and paintings, all performed or created by workers in the sex industry. The point of the show is to take "sex work" and broaden perceptions through a mixture of entertainment and education. Be warned: If you`re easily offended or prone to spells of the vapors, please turn to page 9 and read the CD reviews instead. (They are slightly less likely to offend.) Harlot is brazen. She is brainy. She is free-wheeling and free-thinking. She is woman. Hear her roar. She is nonetheless a hooker. It is what she does in her spare time. But there was a time when her biological experimentation and interactions paid the rent. She is proud of it. Harlot`s latest book is titled Unrepentant Whore. She means it. "These days, I stay pretty busy in the nonbusiness end of sex work," she said. "Let`s just say that I `dabble` and leave at that." Harlot is fiercely dedicated to the cause of challenging the conventionalities of sexuality through advocacy and art. She is a tireless champion of the sex-workers` rights movement. She has coordinated outreach programs for sex workers and was a member of San Francisco`s task force on prostitution. "If we are women, and we are in business, and men are using our business, then we are workers," Harlot said. "We should reap the same benefits as office workers. That`s why I love the Sex Workers Art Show. It`s all about creating art that uses stereotypes to knock down stereotypes. The show evokes strong feelings. And from strong feelings come change.... "My mission on this tour is to decriminalize prostitution and clarify a few misconceptions." Kemp Stroble, a board member of PS 211, said that reasoning is what inspired PS 211 to bring the Sex Workers Art Show to Winston-Salem. "PS 211 was created to be a forum for more obscure artists and musicians to show their work," he said. "This show certainly fits that requirement. I should also add that people who oppose the show`s commentary are invited to attend the event, and organize an event of their own." Annie Oakley is the organizer of The Sex Workers Art Show. She, too, is a former sex worker - a term that Oakley said encompasses everybody from peep-show workers and escorts to hookers and phone-sex employees. She has worked as a dancer and in a massage parlor. She earned a better living as a sex worker than she did when she worked as a construction worker. She became an activist after a gathering of feminists called her anti-feminist for working in the sex trade. "I thought that was totally hypocritical," she said. "A woman`s body is her own.... She makes money off of men. I felt empowered, not degraded.... "The reality is, show me another job where a woman with no training, who can`t speak English, who would otherwise end up homeless, can make a good living and, if she is smart, do it on her own terms. Yet somehow, despite prostitution being legal in various countries, and in certain parts of this country, this is wrong. Where prostitution is legal, HIV cases among sex workers are virtually nonexistent. Sex crimes are down, not up. We`ve done the research. What we have to fight is a social taboo in an increasingly puritanical society." The Sex Workers Art Show lasts 21/2 hours. In many cities, the show encompasses full nudity. That will not be the case at PS 211. "We specifically stated that there would be no nudity," Stroble said. "And we mean it. If that`s what you are looking for, head to the strip clubs. "This is an art show." There are 11 performers in the Sex Workers Show. Some of them, such as Ducky Doolittle, a sex educator and comedian, and Erochica Bamboo, who is Miss Exotic World 2003, enjoy a modicum of mainstream fame that stems from their sexuality. "A lot guys do come expecting to see a lot of naked women," Oakley said, laughing. "Those guys are my favorites. It always makes me feel good to see them come up at the end of the night and say, `You know, this actually has me thinking.` "If you can make a lusting man think, you are doing OK."