← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Ed Toner
Thread ID: 14233 | Posts: 1 | Started: 2004-06-17
2004-06-17 16:53 | User Profile
[url]http://tinyurl.com/3gngd[/url] The art of passion A millionaire grandmother prepares to show the world her unusual collection - erotic art and knickknacks gathered from around the world. By JAMES THORNER, Times Staff Writer Published June 17, 2004
[Times photos: Lance A. Rothstein] Naomi Wilzig has one of the world's biggest private collections of erotic art, more than 5,000 pieces. Her Land O'Lakes townhouse is filled with statues, paintings, figurines, hangings and artwork spanning centuries.
This bronze urn by Emmanuel Villanis, a French artist who lived from 1858 to 1914, is part of Naomi Wilzig's collection of erotic art. Much of the collection will be displayed in a museum she plans to open in Miami Beach.
This Italian marble, wall-mount sculpture depicts a scene from Greek mythology in which Zeus transforms into a swan and seduces Leda. The piece dates from about 1800.
The sexual revolution didn't just pass Naomi Wilzig by, it missed her by a million miles.
As the daughter of Orthodox Jewish parents, marrying outside the faith was forbidden. When she finally found a nice Jewish man, she obligingly dropped out of teachers college to please him. Even after the wedding, she would not consummate the marriage without her parents' blessing.
"I wasn't exposed to the outside world," the 69-year-old millionaire grandmother says. "A kosher hotel in Miami Beach and a kosher hotel in the Catskills: That was my world."
That's why it's so hard to explain the statue of the grinning shoeshine boy with a 3-foot protuberance sitting in .............