Vienna Tourist Board opens OnlyFans account for museums’ ‘explicit’ content

Tired of social media companies blocking or suspending its accounts for publishing artworks depicting nudity, four Viennese museums have come together with the Austrian capital’s tourist board to set up an OnlyFans account.

OnlyFans, which disrupted social media in 2016 by giving creators a platform where they could freely share nude and pornographic content with subscribers now has content from unlikely sources: The Albertina Museum, Leopold Museum, Kunsthistorisches Museum (Art History Museum) and the Naturhistorisches Museum Vienna (Natural History Museum).

World famous artists

Vienna Tourist Board said the city is home to some of the world’s most famous artists including Egon Schiele and Koloman Moser, whose works pushed the boundaries of what was considered acceptable in art and society at the time.

“Besides changing the face of art forever, they are also known for their unflinching depictions of the nude human body,” it said.

This is not the first time artists have fallen foul of the sensors in the past 100 years and the tourist board said the battle against them still rages on.

“With the rise of social media, bans like these are back in headlines once again. Major social media channels like Instagram and Facebook have nudity and “lewd” content firmly in their sights.”

New wave of prudishness

The latest institute to fall foul of what the tourist board calls ‘this new wave of prudishness’ was the Albertina Museum’s TikTok account, which was blocked in July for showing works by the Japanese photographer Nobuyoshi Araki.

In 2018, the Natural History Museum’s photograph of the 25,000-year-old Venus of Willendorf figurine was deemed pornographic by Facebook and removed from the platform.

“Vienna and its art institutions are among the casualties of this new wave of prudishness – with nude statues and famous artworks blacklisted under social media guidelines, and repeat offenders even finding their accounts temporarily suspended,” said the tourist board.

‘Explicit’ artworks

“That’s why we decided to put the capital’s world-famous ‘explicit’ artworks on OnlyFans. By putting Vienna’s historical 18+ content on OnlyFans, subscribers can now view provocative works by the likes of Egon Schiele, Richard Gerstl, Koloman Moser and Amedeo Modigliani – all of which are on show for all to see in the capital.”

In August OnlyFans, one of Britain’s most successful tech startups, announced it would prohibit sexually explicit content as banks had refused to work with them, only to reverse the decision five days later.

Art lovers can now subscription to view the museum’s ‘X-rated’ content on OnlyFans but will also be encouraged to go and see the artworks for themselves in Vienna.