But Is It Art?

Gabrielle sporting a goatee and chest hair. We will be adding new galleries soon! pic.twitter.com/8Cm97452mM

— Sinthetics (@Sinthetics) May 1, 2013

EJ Dickson toured a sex-doll factory and found a bunch of aesthetes:

“There are other doll brands that go solely for usability,” [Sinthetics owner Matt] Krivicke says as he guides me around the shop. “They think the product is just used for sex, so they design around that parameter. I don’t. The function will always be there, but my intent when I’m starting a sculpture is I want to give it life.” … Hearing the pair talk about their dolls as sculptures, it’s easy to dismiss them as misguided or self-deluded. After all, most sex toys, however expensive or elaborate they might be, are designed solely for one purpose—and are used as such.

Yet looking at the dolls, it’s clear what Sinthetics do is a peculiar mix of art and engineering. They spend at least six months crafting each doll to their client’s specifications (they’ve only made 150 during their three years in business), assembling its skeleton, molding its parts one-by-one, and testing out its range of motion (link NSFW) to ensure no sexual positions will compromise the “integrity of the doll’s internal structure.” Which is not to say they have sex with the dolls themselves. “They’re our silicon family,” Keller says. “That’d just be weird.”