thumb|Pornographic magazines on shelves in Japan
Pornographic magazines or erotic magazines, sometimes known as adult magazines or sex magazines, are magazines that contain content of a sexually explicit nature. Softcore pornography magazines contain images – usually photographs – of fully or partially naked people.
In 1880, halftone printing was used to reproduce photographs inexpensively for the first time. The invention of halftone printing took pornography and erotica in new directions at the beginning of the 20th century. The new printing processes allowed photographic images to be reproduced easily in black and white, whereas printers were previously limited to engravings, woodcuts, and line cuts for illustrations. It allowed pornography to become mass-market, making it more affordable and more easily acquired than any previous form. Gradually, this material came to dominate – particularly as other magazines were taken over and absorbed. At times in its post-WWII history, H&E has catered primarily to the soft-porn market.
Another early form of pornography were comic books known as Tijuana bibles that began appearing in the U.S. in the 1920s and lasted until the publishing of glossy colour men's magazines. They were crude hand-drawn scenes often using popular characters from cartoons and culture.
In the 1940s, the word "pinup" was coined to describe pictures torn from men's magazines and calendars and "pinned up" on the wall by U.S. soldiers in World War II. While the 1940s images focused mostly on legs, by the 1950s, the emphasis shifted to breasts. Betty Grable and Marilyn Monroe were two of the most popular pinup models. Monroe continued to be a popular model for the men's magazines in the 1950s.
The 1950s saw the rise of the first mass-market softcore pornographic magazines: Modern Man in 1952 and Playboy in 1953. Hugh Hefner's Playboy started a new style of the men's glossy magazine (or girlie magazine). Hefner coined the term centerfold, and in the first edition of his Playboy used a photograph of a nude Monroe, despite her objections. Another term that became popular with Playboy readers was the "Playboy Playmate". These new-style magazines featured nude or semi-nude women, sometimes simulating masturbation, although their genitals or pubic hair were not actually displayed.
In 1963, Lui started in France to compete against Playboy, while Bob Guccione did the same in the United Kingdom in 1965 with Penthouse. Penthouse's style was different from other magazines, with women looking indirectly at the camera, as if they were going about their private idylls. This change of emphasis influenced erotic depictions of women. Penthouse was also the first magazine to publish pictures that included pubic hair and full frontal nudity, both of which were considered beyond the bounds of the erotic and in the realm of pornography at the time. In 1965, Mayfair was launched in the UK in competition to Playboy and Penthouse. In September 1969 Penthouse was launched in the U.S., bringing new competition to Playboy. Playboy was the first to clearly show visible pubic hair in January 1971. The first full frontal nude centerfold was Playboy's Miss January 1972. In 1974, Larry Flynt first published Hustler in the US, which contained more explicit material. Some researchers have detected increasingly violent images in magazines like Playboy and Penthouse over the course of the 1970s, with them then returning to their more upscale style by the end of the decade. Paul Raymond Publications relaunched Escort in 1980 in the UK, Razzle in 1983, and Men's World in 1988.
Sales of pornographic magazines in the U.S. have declined significantly since 1979, with a nearly 50% reduction in circulation between 1980 and 1989. The fact that the U.S. incidence of rape had increased over the same period has cast doubt on any correlation between magazine sales and sex crimes. Studies from the mid-1980s to the early 1990s nearly all confirmed that pornographic magazines contained significantly less violent imagery than pornographic films.
Common features
In the late 20th century, several magazines featured photos of "ordinary" women submitted by readers, for example the Readers Wives sections of several British magazines such as Fiesta, and Beaver Hunt in the US. of a retail display to prevent children reaching them, hence their euphemistic name top shelf magazines. Alternatively it may be necessary to sell them under the counter or in plastic wrappers. Some retail chains and many independent retail outlets do not stock pornographic magazines. They may also be sold in sex shops or by mail order.
See also
- Fetish magazine
- Glamour photography
- History of erotic depictions
- List of pornographic magazines
- Pubic Wars