Performers: Adele Haze, Pandora Blake
In this dreamlike photoset, Adele Haze lies very still as Pandora Blake writes lines on her naked back in gorgeous calligraphy. For every ink smudge, Adele will get a stroke of the cane.
Photography: PWPimages
Two topless women are engaged in a sensual game: one plays the canvas and the other the artist. Adele Haze lies on cushions, exposing her breasts and bare back - and it's the latter that her lover will write on. Pandora Blake uses black ink and a brush to adorn Adele with intricate Greek lettering.
As Pandora's calligraphy winds around Adele's gorgeous curves, Adele must stay completely still, hardly breathing to avoid nudging Pandora as she writes her lines. In a Victorian school, ink smudges would mean a punishment for the writer. Here, the responsibility to avoid error falls on the writing surface. Pandora weaves her spell in words, and the magic of the moment mustn't be broken. For each smudge, Adele will get a stroke of the cane.
When the text is complete – the first few lines of Homer's 'Iliad' – Pandora carefully examines her work, stripping Adele naked so she can admire the slick black script that covers her body. Afterwards Adele bends naked over the punishment bench in the Scriptorium, exposing every inch of her bare skin. Pandora's found some smudges, and every error earns Adele a hard cane stroke.
Each cold cane stroke makes Adele yelp, biting her thumb to hold back her cries. But after three strokes the punishment is over, and Pandora can step back to admire her work – the neat black lines of text curving round Adele's beautiful body, and the vivid red welts made by the cane.
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I was wondering too what the delicious tension might have been - from both top and bottom perspective - between wanting to create as fine a piece of classical calligraphy on a beautiful natural canvas as possible, and the temptation to smudge a bit more here and there. Just three strokes suggests the artwork of the pen had the upper-hand over the artwork of the cane on this occasion.
Youths and Maidens of Sparta
Life for girls was hard enough by modern standards, however they were at least allowed to stay with their mothers.
Youths however had to leave home at an early age and join the Agoge. There they would learn a different sort of morality. Mrs S took great delight in telling us,
"The Spartans didn't believe there was any thing wrong with stealing, however any body caught would be punished for their ineptitude. The unfortunate youth would have his clothes removed and he would be soundly whipped."
Quite possibly Mrs S wished she could deal with some of the boys in her class in the same manner.