BARCELONA — Erika Lust has built a career at the intersection of art and erotica — so it’s no surprise that after establishing herself as a trailblazer in feminist pornography, she would continue pushing the boundaries of the medium. Her latest venture, House of Erika Lust (2024), is a sprawling immersive art installation that blends Virtual Reality and augmented reality, inviting visitors on a choose-your-own-adventure journey through her expansive cinematic oeuvre.
“On the internet, porn is queen — but there aren’t many places to engage with it in real life,” Lust says. “I think it’s fascinating to put sex in an artistic environment as a shared experience. With VR, you’re not just seeing a film; you’re experiencing it.”
Lust entered the industry in 2004, when she debuted her first film, The Good Girl — a feminist twist on the infamous “pizza delivery guy” plotline, flipping the script by centering the perspective and character development of its female lead. She founded Erika Lust Films in 2005, and soon developed a reputation as the leading advocate for a new type of porn: erotic yet non-heteronormative, artistic yet unpretentious.
Unlike much of the porn found online, Lust’s work prioritizes realistic depictions of female pleasure — addressing issues like boundaries and consent while drawing from lived experiences for inspiration. One of her most popular series, XConfessions (2013–ongoing), reinterprets real sexual fantasies submitted anonymously by viewers. This is the first thing visitors encounter upon entering House of Erika Lust, currently on view in Barcelona’s Poblenou district at a secret location revealed 24 hours before arrival.
Upon entry, I’m handed a masquerade-style mask and encouraged to check my inhibitions at the door. Then I’m ushered into the first room, where a rotating series of XConfessions films are projected against the far wall. My favorite is a submission from Stoya, titled “Dick for a Day” (2023) — in which she experiences what it’s like to, well, have a dick for a day.
Next is the VR experience, where I’m fitted with a headset and let loose in a virtual mansion reminiscent of Sleep No More (2011–25). Each room contains interactive elements: a portrait transforms into a porn scene with a wave of the hand; rubbing a foggy mirror reveals a couple having sex. In the library, I pull a book off the shelf — only for its pages to flip open and begin playing one of Lust’s films.
I’m not the only one looking: There are 20 or so other figures moving around the space, visible to me only as opaque, human-shaped avatars. We don’t have faces, so it’s impossible to identify who’s walking by me — but I can see couples embracing, their transparent hands clasped together. Visitors have five minutes to explore each “floor” before the landscape shifts, and a series of arrows shuffles us to the next adventure.
On the second and third floors, more interactive rooms await. In one, I place my head in a giant orb and am transported to a 360-degree warehouse, where men and women fondle themselves in a circle around me. In another, a marble sculpture begs to be touched — after which it explodes into shards, each playing a different scene. There’s a dungeon, and a door that says “Don’t look.” When you do, it reveals a keyhole into a BDSM scene, where a dominatrix wields a leather whip. Between smacks, she checks in with her submissive, asking, “Is this okay?” This attention to realistic kink dynamics is a hallmark of Lust’s work, offering a counter-narrative to the unrealistic expectations often set by mainstream porn.
House of Erika Lust offers three setting for guests to choose from: erotic, explicit, or “surprise me,” a mix of both. “Explicit is full on: you’re going to see everything,” Lust says. “Erotic is soft — you don’t have to see penises and vaginas if that’s not your thing. And ‘surprise me’ — well, I can’t tell!”
After exploring on the “erotic” setting, I take another turn, this time on the explicit setting. The changes are subtle — like a penis revealed where there was once just over-the-pants touching, or the ability to pull a chain to reveal a new dungeon scene. After that, I go through again on “surprise me” — but I’m not terribly surprised, except when I find myself interacting with objects that don’t respond. I’m enjoying the experience, but I do wish for more variety between the settings.
A final room features a 360-degree screening of Lust’s more artful films, set up gallery-style with seating scattered throughout. Couples lean on each other’s shoulders to watch strangers fuck; artistic close-ups showcase the aesthetic potential of sex. It’s the most confrontational of the rooms, because there’s little plausible deniability: We are pretty much just sitting around together and watching porn — albeit, not necessarily the kind we might select for ourselves.
The installation contains a diverse range of gender and sexuality, providing a window into other people’s erotic imagination. “It’s an individual experience, because everyone chooses their own route through the house,” Lust says. “But it’s also a collective experience, because we are all in the same space.”
In this sense, Lust’s exhibition harks back to the golden age of porn — a time when strangers congregated at movie theaters to watch adult films on 35-millimeter. This return of public porn-viewing arrives at a time when adult content is increasingly censored. Following legislation like FOSTA-SESTA — two bills signed in 2018 that ostensibly targeted sex trafficking, but wound up endangering sex workers — platforms have cracked down on adult content, lest they be held liable for any off-color material that slips through the cracks. And in the absence of pleasure-focused sex education, younger generations turn to pornography for information about sex.
This is the cultural backdrop that informs Lust’s work. Her mission isn’t just to get people off — it’s to get them thinking. She believes that pornography should be interpreted like any other film: as a cultural product with aesthetic and conceptual weight, capable of shaping our desires and worldview. And with House of Erika Lust, she invites viewers to engage with sexuality as they would any other artistic medium: critically, curiously, and without shame.
Since its debut, the exhibition has become a popular destination for couples and girls’ nights out, prompting attendees to reflect on their own relationship with pornography. “Many people still feel shame around sex — they have a hard time talking about it, and feel like it’s something forbidden,” Lust says. “What I love most is hearing people start conversations about sex — conversations they’ve never had before.”
