“IT'S CALLED GOSSIP AND OF COURSE IT'S AN OBSESSION OF MINE -ANDY WARHOL

Two very different events opening in Melbourne next week have interesting takes on this. Sydney-based artist Hazel Dooney has a photography exhibition called Porno opening at MARS Gallery, and AFI winner Bojana Novakovic has directed a Serbian play called Fake Porno, on at Lupa gallery. Interestingly, both Porno, and Fake Porno use the notion of pornography to explore intimacy. "I wanted to present an alternative", says Dooney, whose sometimes explicit photographs are of herself, her lovers, and friends and their lovers. "I've called the exhibition Porno because I wanted to show that the word itself is no longer taboo; it now hints at the socially acceptable. Making a sex video is now a career move, as is being photographed getting out of a car with no underpants on.

-The Age
July 27 2008