I catch fetishes like other people catch colds.

I cruise around the web or a local smut shop, and I see some picture, or read some story about some outrageous kink or another, and I take it home and try it on in my imagination. Then, before I know it, it’s the centerpiece of my fantasy-bill-of-fare for months to come.

For me, the fetish world, the fantasy world, and the world of day-to-day reality have no clear edges. They blend and run together like pastels in a sidewalk drawing after a summer rain. Some kinks I contract from experience, others from fantasy into reality, and still others from the most mundane sources.

That’s the way it is when one has a fertile imagination. And I am a product of my imagination. Most days, I could not say which came first – Me, or the Dream. It’s a hunger I have, a taste for life. A passion for experience. A drive to explore. And a sense of wonder at the universe, which flings me out of bed, and hurls me, wide-eyed and agog at the incredible mechanics of it all, every night. Still, more times than not, the most fascinating topography for me can be found in the valley between the right and left hemispheres of the brain.

On the inside, darker forces are at work... a churning maelstrom of emotions and opinions and ideas that war constantly for my attention. I am wracked with desires, evil and forbidden, depraved and debauched. All seeking expression. Yes, I plunge headfirst into the reality of private dungeons and fetish clubs. Yes, I partake of forbidden fruit, and let the whip fall where it may. I feel the ropes, taste the gag, lick the sweat, and moan in pain and delight, lost in the matte blackness of the blindfold. Yes, I revel in my humiliation. I wallow in my narcissistic pleasure and swim in my agony. I am corrupt, decadent, and depraved... but I think a quick gander at my work will tell you all that. And I so want this bio to be about so much more.

The subject matter
One thing that’s going to pop to mind when viewing my art is “damn, look at all these women! Does she draw anything else?” Well, yes I do draw other things, but not with the same heartfelt, stirring passion. I love Women. I adore Women. Everything good in my life has come from women. They are the source, the center. But here’s the thing. Because I adore women, it is the essence of my erotica that I am drawing, painting, and sculpting FOR women. They are the audience I perceive in my head, the audience that ultimately judges my work.

The perspective is on the sensual side, rather than the crude hunka chunka big gazunga side. That stuff is low and base, though I think it has it place. I’m really reaching for something I at least consider a higher platform. It’s all about the tease for me. The hint of naughtiness in the beauty.

Of course, that’s more of a guideline than a rule. So don’t go emailing me with some pic I did, saying “this isn’t beautiful, it’s smut!” Because, yeah, I do smut too. If I’m feeling smutty.

The impression I want to leave you with here is that this, this work, this site, is my offering to the Goddesses that surround me. These are their galleries. Hence, the gallery titled Mistresses. The Mistresses gallery features portraits of the fabulous Mistresses and Dominant ladies I have met. From Mistress Barbara Darke, with whom I live and serve and adore, to Mistress Kiva, who holds me up and ties me down, to the Mistresses that inspire me or touch my life, and the Fabulous Female Impersonators. These special ladies I admire as the essence of femininity contained in a different form.

The process
The most exciting part of being an artist is the process. It can be full of pathos and comedy, violence and torment. It can be intense, passionate and highly erotic in its own right. The process can be as interesting, if not more so, than the piece itself. And only the artist gets to experience it. Isn’t that sad.

The most aroused I have ever become was when I was sculpting a lifesize mermaid in my studio. It was sweltering hot, so I stripped down naked and began smoothing the surface of my subject with warm water. The smoother the clay became, the more aroused. I was, as my hands explored every crevice and curve of the cool form under my hands. That’s when it hit me: damn, this is really sexy!

For a brief time, I was doing tattoos at this little shop in Denver. One night, three sexy little girls – each no more than 19 years old – came into the shop. They all wanted tiny mushrooms tattooed on their right breasts, as a sign of friendship. I went to work. I stretched the skin taught and applied the machine, dipping it in ink, and feeling their intensity, their trembling flesh under my hands... looking into their eyes, which reflected their pain and stimulated with crystal shard catchlights around their retinas... I glimpsed the sexual power and magic of art. Now that’s fetish-erotica, babe. No intercourse, but a heightened stimulation of the mind and body, shared and yet totally innocent... all in the mind, all in the senses, and all consuming. This was nasty. And when it was over, we all looked at each other and agreed without a word that it was really a special moment.

I have this theory about fetish versus straight sex. With regards to straight sex, erotic art is the imitation of the act. In fetish-erotica art, life imitates art, not the other way round. The art triggers the action. The artists and writers were the first guidelines for fetishes. And to this day, the art created stimulates the real-life play and encounters. Performing a fetish erotic act is seeking to become art.

So that’s where I always start with my fetish work. I start with the feeling, the arousal, the sensation, and then I begin to draw. I think of the invisible line that runs through a well-composed piece, the line that will draw the viewer around the picture, or through the sculpture. And I draw that, then the figures. The eyes are very important, the expression. My drawings must emote, they must feel and express. So many artists, particularly erotic artists, forget this... and I think it leaves their art flat, uninteresting, despite the seeming beauty. One of the cutest and sexiest examples of art that emotes is a favorite Bettie Page photo, in which she is administering an over-the-knee spanking to a model. Bettie wears a wicked evil smile as she draws her hand back, armed with what looks like a wooden frat paddle. Wow! The picture I’ve got here in this bio isn’t the same one (hey, if you have the one I’m thinking of, email it to me, huh?), but the principle is there... it emotes!

Of course, sometimes the expression is subtle... an attitude in the pose, a flex of the wrist, the turn of an ankle, but it’s there. Look for it in my work. It’s a fun exercise.

Once the pencils are down, then comes the paint. I use an Aztek airbrush, which for me is the most moron-simple tool for the job. I don’t want to be fussing with some complicated piece of equipment, having it stand between me and the sex act I’m about to perform on the canvas. It’s like fussing with the wrong size condom. It’s gonna kill the mood.

I start with the skin tone, and I try to keep this light, and as simple as possible. I tease the skin out of the paper in layers.... foreplay is so important. It isn’t the destination, baby, it’s the journey that counts. I read this article once, where Alberto Vargas was talking about how he achieved the effects in his paintings, and it was amazing. In the article, the one thing he seemed to go on and on about was the color Burnt Umber. He was fixated on the tone. The secret to the color of flesh and life is brown, shades of brown, lighter, darker, but fundamentally brownness. I started seeing the world differently after reading that. Yes, life is very brown, and brown is good. I like to keep the pallette limited and closer to the primaries than many artists.

By the time I’m done, I will no doubt have applied paint, ink, pencil, Prismacolor, Sharpies. Sometimes even makeup. There also might be a Coca-Cola stain, or a smear of cigarette ash. Some lines are very precise, while in others, the brush strokes are apparent. And sloppy. I do this on purpose.

When I was kid, I went to see a touring art exhibit. Hanging as the star of the show was a Rembrandt. I stared at this painting for thirty minutes, even though my class had moved on... what caught my eye wasn’t the image, or the details, or the details inside the details. It was a highlight on the lower left corner of the piece, a fingerprint, possibly a thumb, in the oil paint...preserved like a fossil impression: Rembrandt’s thumb. A real human had painted this, by hand. There was the proof – as meticulous as the rest of the work was, here was this glaring boo-boo that marked it as hand-crafted painting. That made it more real for me, and more important than any other piece of art in the entire museum.

Somewhere in the eighties, photo-realism and fussy crisp clean automaton art replaced the real artist. An artist, where you can see the mistakes, the brush strokes, the imperfections. The personal touch was gone, and it was all about flawless technique painting, like a machine. And with the advent of paint shop computer programs, the artist is removed once again, one step further from her work. The little screw ups and boo boos mark a real artist. The imperfections are what make the work and the artist one. Look for my mistakes, laugh at them, enjoy them, they are mine and mine alone. Just know that I’m keeping it as honest as possible.

The influences
First, my greatest influence would have to be Virgil Finlay, the amazing illustrator from Weird Tales, in the 30s through the 50s. Amazing pen and ink work. Check it out. Also from Weird Tales, Margaret Brundage, a pastel cover artist. Her depictions, with homoerotic overtones, to this day still fill me awe. Hans Bok with his primitive wood cuts and geometric insanity. Earl Burgey from Startling Stories was also awesome, he had a real Hollywood look to his art. Lawrence from Famous Fantastic mysteries also had similar feel, with writhing human forms in the center of flowers. Many other works by uncredited and forgotten artists that graced the covers of pulp magazines were equally powerful to me... lurid, sexy, fetish, erotic, and unforgettable.

Of the cheesecake artists, of course, Alberto Vargas during his war-time Esquire period... followed closely by Elvegren, Zoe Mozert, and Moran. In the underground fetish-erotic period, Stanton and Eneg really got me excited. Loved the attention to detail, especially considering that, at the time, nobody gave a rat’s ass about the fetish art genre. Jose Gonzales, one of the greatest overlooked erotic artist of all time, was incredible.... lovingly painting Vampirella in mind-blowing detail and realism. In the long history of Vampi, nobody has ever, ever done it better. Warren Publishing’s Bernie Wrightson always could blow my mind, and Brian Bolland of Judge Dredd fame equally rocked. And coming into the eighties, Olivia. The daring artist willing to try all kinds of styles on us, and challenge the entire erotic world, and single-handedly raise erotic art above its shadowed past and take it into the mainstream boldly. Thanks Olivia. And finally, Helmut Newton, not because he painted, but because his photos are each and every one a twisted fetish fantasy. Unbelievably daring.

I want to credit Penthouse’s Wicked Wanda. And the demented work of Prissy Sissy Crissy, the machinations of the House of Gord, The Other World Kingdom, and Skin Two magazine, for spinning me right round baby in new directions. Also Elvira, Mistress of the Dark, Emma Peel, and Barbarella, for probably giving me my first fantasy fodder.

And, of course, last but not least, the many, many Mistresses who bring the fantasies to life in the real world, and provide sanctuary and succor to depraved dreams.

Carpe Noctum
Veronica Vinyl