Press Releases

Latest Press Release

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

ECOSEXUAL ARTISTS LAUNCH WEBSITE FOR THEIR NEW INSTITUTE OF SEXECOLOGY
Valentine’s Day, Feb. 14, 2012

Movers and shakers of the ecosex revolution, artists Elizabeth Stephens and Annie Sprinkle, launched a new web site, which will be the online gathering place for ecosex art, theory, practice, and activism. Sexecology.org is designed to blossom and grow over the coming years. However, the new website is already chock full of goodies, such as photos and documentation from their ecosex weddings, workshops, performance art, ecosex walking tours, visual art, and their Ecosex Manifesto. Visitors can find ecosex related resources, posters and bumper stickers. A free download of the first issue of the Journal of Ecosex Research is a real score.

Although Stephens and Sprinkle use a lot of humor, they are serious about ecosex education as viable strategy to help the Earth. Their aim is to “make the environmental movement a little more sexy, fun and diverse.” One day they’d like to see an “E” added to GLBTQI. People of any sexual orientation can be ecosexual, however they admit that “this budding sexual identity, with its eroticizing of nature, can be rather queer and kinky in some people’s minds. But all sex is actually ecosex, as we are really part, not separate from nature. After all, humans are made up mostly of water.”

The new website was designed by artist Daniel Wasko, who is himself an ecosexual. With his sex positive attitudes, and personal fetish for waterfalls, Wasko is poised to become the web master to the ecosexuals. Wasko has been working with other creative artists in order to create affordable solutions that enable them to better promote themselves and their work. He says, “Art excites me most when it can transform the way you see yourself and the world around you. I love when art is trailblazing and revolutionary and envisions possibilities never imagined. I think websites offer a unique way of announcing yourself to the world and I get a big charge from being able to show off the work of other artists through my design work.”

Interested folks can go to the “book us” section of the site to bring Annie Sprinkle and Beth Stephens to their part of the Earth. “Have trees? We’ll travel.”

Hi resolution press photos of Sprinkle & Stephens are on sexecology.org in the press section. Please credit photographers.

Daniel Wasko Design  facebook page | danielwasko.com

Past Press Releases

• ECOSEXUALS UNITE FOR AN ECOSEX SYMPOSIUM & ART EXHIBIT
• SEXECOLOGY: MAKING LOVE WITH THE EARTH, SKY AND SEA: Collages, photographs, wedding costumes/ephemera + an ecosexual walking tour
• COUNTY PARKS AND LAPD ALLOW BIG, GAY, ECOSEXUAL ART-WEDDING IN FARNSWORTH PARK TO GO ON
• ECOSEXUALS UNITE FOR THE WORLD’S FIRST ECOSEX SYMPOSIUM
• ECOSEXUALS GATHER TOGETHER FOR A PURPLE WEDDING TO THE MOON

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – JUNE 2011
San Francisco, CA

ECOSEXUALS UNITE FOR AN ECOSEX SYMPOSIUM & ART EXHIBIT

The Ecosex Symposium II– a public forum where art meets theory meets practice meets activism—will take place June 17-19 at the Center for Sex & Culture in San Francisco, CA. What’s an ecosexual? Why are skinny-dipping, tree-hugging and mysophila so pleasurable? Where is the e-spot? Can the budding ecosexual movement help save the world? What is this new sexual identity and environmental activist strategy all about? These are some of the questions that will be explored. Femina Potens Gallery is producing the event in collaboration with Center for Sex & Culture.

Annie Sprinkle, Ph.D., a feminist-porn-star and artist turned “SexEcologist,” and Elizabeth Stephens, a UCSC art professor and environmental activist are organizing this event. The two women explain, “as a strategy to create a more mutual and sustainable relationship with our abused and exploited planet, we are changing the metaphor from the Earth as mother, to Earth as lover.”

Sprinkle and Stephens kick off the weekend with their “Ecosex Manifesto,” an art exhibit with new collages, wedding ephemera (they married the snow in Ottawa, the moon in Los Angeles and the mountains in West Virginia), and a manifesto. They have also invited a dozen other artists to display their related works.

Ecosexual author of the seminal text, Gaia and the New Politics of Love, Serena Anderlini, Ph.D., from the University of Puerto Rico will present the keynote address. What is Ecosexual Love?:A Guide to the Arts and Joys of Amorous Inclusiveness. Good Vibration’s sexologist, Carol Queen, Ph.D., will explore The Sexology of Ecosexuality. Dr. Robert Lawrence, Ph.D. will cover ecosex fetishes. Also presenting is Madison Young, the award winning queer porn movie director and the Femina Potens Gallery director. She will cover the Greening of the Sex Industry. Artist Tania Hammidi will perform a dance piece about conflict, genocide and olive trees in the Middle East. Other presenters are artists Dylan Bolles & Sasha Hom, Amy Champ, and the legendary porn actress, Sharon Mitchell, Ph.D., who will talk about The Sensual Pleasures of Gardening. The author of the book Ecosex; Go Green Between the Sheets and Make Your Love Life Sustainable, Stephanie Iris Weiss will be Skyping in from New York. Erospirit Institute director, Joseph Kramer, Ph.D. will guide the group in some somatic ecosex practices. Amy Marsh shares how toxins ate her sex life, and performance artist Tessa Wills offers an Anal Ecology performance piece. There are twenty five scheduled presenters, and there will also be an open mic forum for attendees to share their work and ideas. Becka Shertzer’s Brazennectar and Mister Cream team up to create and serve a gourmet, “ecosexi-love-a-licious” vegan lunch.

Expected to attend the conference are artists, activists, theoreticians, nature fetishists, environmentalists, ecosex community movers and shakers and people from many other walks of life. These events are sponsored by Femina Potens Gallery in collaboration with the Center for Sex & Culture. Stephens and Sprinkle received a cultural equity grant from the San Francisco Arts Commission to help make it all possible.

All the details and advanced tickets are available at SexEcology.org  The producers of these events say that their aim is to “make the environmental movement a little more sexy, fun and diverse.” They’d also like to see an “E” added to GLBTQI

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE  – October 17, 2010

LA COUNTY PARKS AND LAPD ALLOW BIG, GAY, ECOSEXUAL ART-WEDDING IN FARNSWORTH PARK TO GO ON

Brides to be, Annie Sprinkle and Elizabeth Stephens were stunned when the Deputy Director of the LA County Parks and Rec Department called them on a Friday afternoon to inform them that their Farnsworth Amphitheater rental contract (in Atladena, CA) had been cancelled. This call came just two weeks before their big full moon wedding was to take place there. The brides flashed back to a rainy day at the San Francisco City Hall in 2004 when their original legal wedding was cancelled by a court order banning gay marriage. They were distraught.

The Altadena Blog had posted an announcement about the bride’s “ecosexual” themed wedding. Someone read about it and tried to stop it from happening. They complained to the Parks Department. For some reason, the Parks Department and the Sheriff decided that they didn’t want this ecosexual wedding in Altadena. The Parks Department contacted Sprinkle and told her the wedding was cancelled due to “public safety” concerns. The alleged reason was that since there had been a few postings on a few websites about the wedding, it was likely that thousands of people would attend, and that there was simply insufficient parking. The Parks Department and the Sheriff claimed there were only 65 parking spaces available, and thus the wedding couldn’t take place in Altadena. This reason was clearly a pretext, since the contract the Parks Department had already signed with Sprinkle authorized 500 participants, so obviously there were enough parking spaces for 500 (and not just 65 spaces). Quick Internet research showed many other events and concerts at the Park involving hundreds of attendees that were advertised widely, both over the Internet and in print publications, and that the Park’s MySpace page says it has a capacity of 1,300. The brides were troubled because they sensed that something else was going on. They felt that they were being discriminated against because this was a wedding of two women, and also because of discrimination against the environmental themes of the wedding.

Their wedding officiant, the New York based preacher-performer Reverend Billy, and his director and wife Savitri D., were outraged at this sudden venue cancellation. Reverend Billy said, “It is bad enough that same sex marriage is illegal in California but now even the performance of a same sex marriage is called un-safe. Reverend Billy and Savitri presented this case to a well-known constitutional lawer, Terry Gross of San Francisco-based Gross Belsky Alonso LLP, who is a fierce advocate for First Amendment Rights and also Burning Man’s general counsel. Gross then forced the LA Parks and Rec Department to withdraw its cancellation, by demonstrating to the Parks and Recreation Department that the cancellation violated state and federal constitutions and laws — just in time for the upcoming nuptials to proceed as planned.

Sprinkle and Stephens explain, “We are lovers, not fighters, but we had no choice except to fight this. We tried to find other venues but nothing appropriate was available on such short notice. Family and friends are flying in from all over the US, and overseas, there was no way we could change the date. We’re very happy to have Farnsworth Park Amphitheater back. It’s beautiful and we love the mountain setting. Now that there is peace in the land we can finally start to write our vows and spread the love. And if you are coming to the wedding, please car pool. Its better for the environment.”

Press Release, October 8, 2010

ECOSEXUALS UNITE FOR THE WORLD’S FIRST ECOSEX SYMPOSIUM

LOS ANGELES, CA.—What’s an ecosexual? Why are skinny-dipping, mysophilia and arboreal frottage so pleasurable? Where is the e-spot? Can the budding ecosexual movement help save the world? These are some of the questions that will be discussed at an Ecosex Symposium; a public forum where art meets theory meets sex education meets practice. The organizers of this first of its kind event are Annie Sprinkle, Ph.D., a feminist-porn-star and artist, turned “sexecologist,” and Elizabeth Stephens, a UCSC art professor and environmental activist. The two women explain, “As a strategy to create a more mutual and sustainable relationship with our abused and exploited planet, we are switching the metaphor from the Earth as mother, to Earth as lover.” The Symposium will be on Sunday afternoon, Oct. 24th, at the cutting-edge art hotbed, Highways Performance Space, in Santa Monica. A diverse panel of artists, academics, sex educators, and environmental activists will take turns presenting, performing, showing and telling.

Ecosex relationship coach, and author of Polyamory in the 20th Century, Debora Taj Anapol, Ph.D. will give an overview of what ecosex is all about– clinically, spiritually and socio-politically. Eocsexual theorist and author of seminal text, Gaia and the New Politics of Love, Serena Anderlini, Ph.D. is flying in from University of Puerto Rico to present her views about “how the Earth stores and runs the energy of love.” Good Vibration’s resident sexologist, Carol Queen, Ph.D., will be discussing ecorotic issues in the sex toy industry. Kamala Devi and the Tantra Theater will act out the audience’s ecosex fantasies. Dr. Robert Lawrence, Ph.D., will cover ecosex fetishes. The panels will be moderated by TV and film actor, Veronica Hart, who will also offer an animal rights perspective. Award winning porn stars Jiz Lee and April Flores, and porn director Carlos Batts will discuss green porn and present a waterfall scene from their film, Dangerous Curves. Tania Hammidi will do a dance piece about conflict, genocide and olive trees. Comedic relief will come from EcoElf. The editor of the highbrow art magazine, Ms. Use, will attend from Israel to show off her ecosex themed issue. Other artists collaborating are C. Finley, Spyce Spycey, Luna Bella, Joegh Bullock, Lady Monster, Cindy Baker, Megan Morman, HB3, Dylan Bowls, Jayme Waxman and others.

The Symposium is also a “honeymoon” for organizers, Elizabeth Stephens and Annie Sprinkle. The day before the symposium, they will have an ecosexual Purple Wedding to the Moon. http://loveartlab.org/ Their aim, they say is “to inspire others to make the environmental movement a little more sexy, fun and diverse.”

Event sponsors are Good Vibrations, the Center For Sex and Culture, Femina Potens Gallery, Luna Pads, Monterey Bay’s kinky B+B Ahintofleather.com, 3 Way Kiss, Bondassage.com and Aki’s Cup Cakes. The organizers are looking for a few more eco-minded sponsors. They also invite individuals to get involved by contributing as backers through the Kickstarter fundraising platform. In exchange, backers get their names in the program, moon-shaped tit prints, and Beth Stephens’ sculptures of Annie Sprinkle’s bronzed panties! http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/152588950/purple-wedding-to-the-moon-and-ecosex-honeymoon-sy

Ecosex Symposium Honeymoon
October 24th.
3:00-6:00
Highways Performance Space, 1651 18th Street,
Santa Monica, Ca., 90404
http://www.highwaysperformance.org/
Everyone over 18 is invited to attend.
Please wear purple.

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Press Release, October 5, 2010

ECOSEXUALS GATHER TOGETHER FOR A PURPLE WEDDING TO THE MOON & AN ECOSEX SYMPOSIUM HONEYMOON

LOS ANGELES, CA.– Hundreds of “ecosexual” artists, academics, famous sex workers, and environmental activists are heading to Los Angeles for a Purple Wedding to the Moon, the brainchild of artist-brides, Annie Sprinkle and Elizabeth Stephens. This will be their sixth large-scale, ecology inspired wedding. “The environment has always been our creative partner, as in ‘ashes to ashes, dust to dust,’ says Elizabeth Stephens, an art professor at the University of California in Santa Cruz, whose personal roots lie in West Virginia where mountaintop removal mining runs rampant. “In a twist on the traditional marriage vows, each of our eco-themed weddings is an invitation for people to ‘promise to love, honor, and cherish the Earth, Sky, Sea and Moon until death brings us closer together forever’.” Annie Sprinkle, Ph.D., a porn star turned eco-sexologist emphasizes the fecundity of the earth; she links fertility and imagination. “We aim to make the environmental movement a little more sexy, fun and diverse through art.”

Purple Wedding to the Moon’s Venue is To Be Announced, but will be held in Los Angeles, on October 23rd, the night of the full moon.

Four hundred guests are expected to attend and over one hundred artists will collaborate on the creation of the wedding. The unorthodox union will be officiated by the popular performance artist Reverend Billy, accompanied by the Church of Life After Shopping Choir– the subjects of the documentary film, What Would Jesus Buy? produced by Morgan Sperlock. Reverend Billy’s sermons and activism about the “Shopocolypse,” over-consumption, and corporate greed have gotten him arrested dozens of times.

Stephens, Sprinkle and Reverend Billy got upset when they learned that N.A.S.A. had bombed the moon prospecting for water. They wondered “why can’t we just take better care of the water here on Earth?”  “We wanted to do something,” cried Stephens.  “So we are marrying the Moon, but it’s really also about loving the Earth.”  Last year Sprinkle and Stephens married the Sea in Italy at the Venice Biennale.  They have also married the Earth in Croatia and the Sky in England. The wedding participants now number in the thousands. Reverend Billy is taking his new Earth-allujah! show on the road, premiering Oct. 21 at the Disney Theater. http://www.revbilly.com/events/cali-tour

For the honeymoon, the movers and shakers of this budding ecosexuality movement will hold the world’s first Ecosex Symposium at Highways Performance Space in Santa Monica, the day after the wedding. “We’ll switch the metaphor from ‘Earth as mother,’ to ‘Earth as lover,’ to garner a more reciprocal relationship with our beautiful planet. We’ll explore what ecosexuality is about from many perspectives: with panels, performances and moon pies. “All adults are welcome.” Stephens and Sprinkle say enthusiastically. Cindy Baker and Megan Morman, two artists coming from Canada created and will unfurl the world’s first ecosexual pride flag.

The artist-brides are looking for a few more sponsors and collaborators. On board are California Institute of the Arts, GT’s Kombucha, Center for Sex and Culture, Good Vibrations, ONE Amazon Acai and Luna Pads. They also invite individuals to contribute as backers through the Kickstarter fundraising platform. In exchange, backers get their names in the wedding program, moon-shaped tit prints, and Beth Stephens’ sculptures of Annie Sprinkle’s bronzed panties! http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/152588950/purple-wedding-to-the-moon-and-ecosex-honeymoon-sy

“Unfortunately our marriage to the Moon will not be legal.” the brides lament. “Nonetheless it is a most sacred union.” They request that everyone please wear purple. The wedding is free and open to the public, “its a big, juicy, pollen-amourous labor of love.”

Some of the many performers and artists participating (in random order) are professor/art-activist Larry Bogad, ecosexual opera singer Emma McNairy, flower girl Lucky (Adam Harms), songstress Kim Mears, fire hula hooper Sarah Starlight & Company, burlesque sensation and fire tassle queen Lady Monster, songwriter Xandra Coe, disgruntled heiress Naomi Pitcarin, Balkan singer Nada Miljkovic, author Greg Archer, performance artist Lian Amaris, film maker Cheryl Dunye, Middle East food artist Diala Khasawnih, experimental musican no.e sunflowrfish, tattoo performance The Granny Smiths, DJ Club Joy. Music by HB3 Solo Picolo, sex worker activist Mariko Passion, cake and puppet artist Pratbha, ritualist Alan Tofelson, Dylan Bolles, Hate Bear, sexpert Jayme Waxman, flag artists Cindy & KC Baker, and many others. Directed by Bonnie Cullum,

Some of the Ecosex Symposium presenters and artists: Ecosexual Relationship Coach and Author, Debora Anapol Ph.D.; humanities professor and author of Gaia and the New Politics of Love, Serena Anderlini; Good Vibration’s eco-sexologist, Dr. Carol Queen, Ph.D.; Hawaiian gender queer porn star, Jiz Lee; performance artist Tania Hamidi,  ecosex comedian EcoElf, Bliss University’s Kamala Devi with the Tantra Theater Group, C. Finley, Spyce, and others to be announced. Moderated by adult film director/star, Veronica Hart.

Annie Sprinkle & Elizabeth Stephens’ Purple Wedding to the Moon
Officiated by Reverend Billy with the Church of Life After Shopping Choir

Saturday, Oct. 23, 2010 Venue To Be Announced, Los Angeles (Altadena), CA

Ecosex Symposium Honeymoon

October 24th.  3:00-6:00 Panels, performances, moon pies. Highways Performance Space, Santa Monica, Ca. http://www.highwaysperformance.org/ Adults only.

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