Ero guro (Japanese:エログロ) is an artistic genre that puts its focus oneroticism, sexual corruption, anddecadence.[1] As a term, it is used to denote something that is both erotic andgrotesque.
The term itself is an example ofwasei-eigo, a Japanese combination of English words or abbreviated words:ero fromerotic andguro fromgrotesque.[2] The "grotesqueness" implied in the term refers to things that are malformed, unnatural, or horrific.[1] Items that are pornographic and bloody are not necessarilyero guro, and vice versa. The term is often mistaken by Western audiences to mean "gore" – depictions of horror, blood, and guts.
Ero guro art experienced a boom whenero guro nansensu, asubculture characterized as a "prewar, bourgeois cultural phenomenon that devoted itself to explorations of the deviant, the bizarre, and the ridiculous",[3] manifested in the popular culture ofTaishō Tokyo during the 1920s.[4] WriterIan Buruma describes the social atmosphere of the time as "a skittish, sometimes nihilistic hedonism that bringsWeimar Berlin to mind."[4] Its roots go back to artists such asTsukioka Yoshitoshi, who, besides eroticshunga, also produced woodblock prints showingdecapitations and acts of violence from Japanese history.Ukiyo-e artists such asUtagawa Kuniyoshi presented similar themes with bondage,rape and eroticcrucifixion.
Ero guro nansensu's first distinct appearance began in the 1920s and 1930sJapanese literature. TheSada Abe Incident of 1936, where a womanstrangled her lover to death andcastrated his corpse, struck a chord with theero guro nansensu movement but shortly led to the censorship of related media.[5] Other similar activities and movements were generally suppressed in Japan duringWorld War II, but re-emerged in the postwar period, especially inmanga andmusic.[6]
Over time, theero guro nansensu movement's influence expanded into parts of Japanesetheatre,art, manga, and eventually into film and music.
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Ero guro is also an element of manyJapanese horror films andpink films, particularly of the 1960s and 1970s. Examples includeTeruo Ishii'sShogun's Joy of Torture (1968) andHorrors of Malformed Men (1969) andYasuzo Masumura'sBlind Beast (1969), the latter two based on the works ofEdogawa Ranpo. A more recent example ofero guro in cinema isSion Sono'sStrange Circus (2005).
There are modernero guro artists, some of whom citeero guro nansensu as an influence on their work. These artists explore themacabre intermingled with sexual overtones. Often the erotic element, even when not explicit, is merged with grotesque themes and features similar to the works ofH. R. Giger. Others produceero guro as a Subgenre ofJapanese pornography andhentai involvingblood,gore,disfiguration,violence,mutilation,urine,enemas, orfeces. This Subgenre of pornography is colloquially known among internet circles simply as "guro".
Well-knownero guromanga artists includeSuehiro Maruo,Hideshi Hino,Hajime Yamano,Jun Hayami,Go Nagai,Shintaro Kago,Toshio Maeda,Henmaru Machino,Yamamoto Takato,Horihone Saizō, Katsuhisa Kigitsu, Uziga Waita, andOsada Not.
The modern genre oftentacle rape began within the category ofero guro (although it has much older roots in Japanese art; seeGirl Diver and Octopi) but became so popular that it is now usually considered separately.
Somevisual kei bands have a concept or theme relating toero guro, most notablyCali Gari.[7] Western visual kei fans assumed their theme was a subgenre of visual kei and linked it with other similar bands.
The 2014Flying Lotus albumYou're Dead! prominently featuredero guro artwork from Japanese manga artist Shintaro Kago on the cover and inner sleeve, with further art being utilised in the accompanying live show. Much of the drawings featured men and women being disfigured and mutilated in unrealistic, hi-tech ways, with a significant amount of gore and nudity.
