Photos from Greece’s Gay Porn Booths & Glory Holes: Where Men Meet for Sex IRL
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DAZED has an amazing collection of photos by photographer Helias Doulis that explores Athens, Greece’s remaining sex cinemas and porn booths – “private spaces where strangers can still meet for illicit IRL encounters.”
Doulis’ photo project A Faggot’s Destiny explores his fascination with these clandestine, sequestered spaces which still offer chance IRL experiences with unknown individuals. In a conversation over email, the Greek-born photographer describes the allure of Athens’ downtown porn booths and tells us about how he recreated scenes of intimacy within them for his photo shoot. Having gathered together a group of willing strangers, Doulis allowed them to explore the porn booths and shot them using a torch as a searchlight, which he says “felt like hunting for sex fantasies”.
He also explains the title, A Faggot’s Destiny, which originates from a poem he wrote in 2016. Using the word “faggot” is an act of reclamation and healing for the photographer, whose reappropriation of this term of abuse – hurled at him so frequently during his youth – feels to him like a way of overcoming his oppressors.
Take a look through the gallery above for a selection of images from A Faggot’s Destiny. Below, we talk with Helias Doulis about the beauty of anonymity, the evolution of gay culture, and the romance, adventure, and adrenaline of Athens’ inner-city gay porn booths with “the smell of pee, the manly cologne, the fear of being recognised.”
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“From the cruising parks to the porn booths, gay culture has entered the gay dating app era, where we no longer have to risk our safety in the woods or the cinemas, but create digital sex memories with strangers who we might never meet in person” – Helias Doulis
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