Ken Marcus - California Club - 1996

"California Club" is a photobook by American photographer Ken Marcus. Marcus, who worked for publications like "Playboy" and "Penthouse," was at the forefront of commercial erotic photography in America during the 1970s and 80s, while also consistently focusing his camera on marginal cultures such as S&M and fetishism.

This book, set against the backdrop of a California-based S&M community, captures the intersection of fetish cultures in Japan and the US through the figures of Japanese bondage artist Takashi Nagaike and American performer Aile Levin.

While witnessing the intersection of staged images and real bodies, this book quietly reveals the distance and relationship between the representation of desire and the reality of the community.