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A woman is pleasured by an octopus, its tentacles teasing their way into her every orifice. A kitten paws eagerly at a man's testicles while he is locked in an embrace with his lover. Two women dally together, a dildo fastened around a waist; one urges the other: "Hurry up and put it in."
Not for the shy or prudish - nor, indeed, for under-16s unaccompanied by an adult, according to official guidance - this is the British Museum's most sexually explicit exhibition since its foundation in 1753. It is devoted to Japanese shunga, an art that flourished from the 17th to the mid-19th century.
According to Tim Clark, the show's head curator: "We hope that once people have got over the sexually explicit content and the exaggerated depiction of genitals, they will come to enjoy the mutual pleasure depicted, the humour and, ultimately, the humanity of these images."
He said the exhibition - which carries warnings of sexually explicit material at the door and for those booking online - was long overdue. Although shunga, meaning "spring picture" or...