There is something about encountering the word censored that compels us to look closer, to read more carefully, to listen with intention. Censorship was at the heart of Packed for Pleasure, a group exhibition presented by the Tom of Finland Foundation at R E G A R D in Paris.

Bringing together images, publications, and archival material, the exhibition offered a map of the artists and cultural histories shaped by censorship, obscenity, and the ever-shifting boundaries of what we are permitted to see.

Moving between fine art, literature, erotic imagery, publishing, and contemporary digital culture, the exhibition was curated by Brooke Wise, Chief Curator of the Tom of Finland Foundation. 

 “Censorship has never made people stop looking, making, or desiring—it has only changed the routes they take to find one another,” said Wise. “There’s a strange creativity born from being told no. Packed for Pleasure brings together artists across generations to look at how desire is pictured, circulated, and made visible—and how the freedom to do so has changed over time.”

The exhibition’s impetus extended beyond contemporary debates around censorship, online platforms, and de-platforming. The exhibition also looked back at history, including through its archival material: Le Livre blanc, the homoerotic text first published anonymously in Paris in 1928 and later illustrated by Jean Cocteau.

While Tom of Finland’s work was included in the exhibition, it was joined by an array of artists, among them Nicolo Gentile. His work Hold on Me considered queer spaces, the people who made them matter, and what happens when they disappear.

“ I made the work using hand impressions from older gay men who went to Philadelphia’s 12th Street Gym, cast in aluminum salvaged from the gym when it was demolished. I wanted to take all that muscle, machinery, sweat, sex, and history and turn it toward something more intimate. Aging, memory, touch, and the physical traces we leave on one another.” Gentile reflected.

Presented with support from Pornhub, a platform at the center of ongoing conversations around censorship and the limits of online expression, Packed for Pleasure gave viewers the chance to touch and witness things we have often been taught are not ours to see.

Install Images by Paul Hennebelle