THE EROTIC PROJECT is softness as protest and pleasure for all. It is a living, breathing, growing collaborative multimedia healing-arts platform conceived by queer artist/director/writer Aubrié Costello in their bedroom in South Philly, all alone, during quarantine. As an established artist for over a decade, they were left scratching their head, wanting to make something that could be somewhat helpful and healing during a tough time. THE EROTIC PROJECT was born in solitude and now features over 40 collaborators from all over the globe. It reclaims the erotic as salve, solace, sanctuary, and survival for queer folks. This work is reimagined, new erotica that centers queer desire, erotic intelligence, and communal catharsis.

Since 2020, Costello has co-created and revealed many thoughtful inclusive accessible interactive literary, sensory, and community-based offerings to inspire full body expression and intimate pleasure practice to restore ourselves so that we can better show up for each other.

What began as two foundational works, the SOFT Book and the FEEL Erotic Prompt Deck, has grown into an expansive ecosystem of zines, books, audiobooks, films, fiber art installations, exhibitions, screenings, community events, and participatory archives that blur the boundaries between public and private, body and self, story and truth-telling. The project is guided by one belief: that our new erotica, written from an authentic, unashamed, queer lens, can help nurture meaningful intimacy, holistic healing, and vital (re)connection in a time of incessant harm, trauma, and our attempted erasure.

Through poetry, prose, sound, and film, THE EROTIC PROJECT transforms literature into a living, communal creative practice. It builds soft safe spaces for witnessing, reflection, and trust-building. In an age of censorship and disconnection, it insists that vulnerability is power and that softness is not weakness but pragmatic strategy. This is softness as resistance and softness as protest of the internalized hardening and desensitization we continually learn and habitually exhibit. Since the inception of THE EROTIC PROJECT, we’ve believed that having the time and space to investigate the power of self care should not be a luxury.

Pleasure is for ALL.

SOFT: A Literary Catalyst for Queer Healing ~

SOFT is Costello's debut book of queer erotic poetry, prose, nonfiction, interviews, and visual storytelling. It is a 204-page, 23,500-word collection structured into thirteen chapters: Ache, Gaze, Feel, Home, Roam, Seen, Play, Tame, Burn, Deep, Love, Rest, Want. It was conceived during years of isolation, political unrest, racial reckoning, and deep longing, created as a balm for the emotionally exhausting period between 2016 and 2023.

More than a book, SOFT is a robust refuge for queer readers and their co-conspirators seeking language that honors their distinct, nuanced experiences with care. Each chapter weaves poetry, textile imagery, and photographic portraiture into a meditation on desire, grief, and community. The book features over forty LGBTQIA2S+ contributors including Raquel Salas Rivera, Ursula Rucker, Dáe Lee, Lou Badger, Arien Wilkerson, Frankie Shaw, Guillermo Cassar, Che Che Luna, Kingsley Ibeneche, Alan Aldana, Amina El Kabbany, Vernon Jordan III, Kara Jubin, Numa Perrier, and so many more. It is a piece of new erotica, a literary and visual experience that unites embodied intellect, body, and unbreakable spirit while reframing queer erotica as a tool for collective healing.

Designed, printed, and published in Philadelphia in limited editions, SOFT sold out at Asian Arts Initiative, Icebox Project Space, Ulises Books, W Philadelphia, and KkCo Los Angeles. Readers describe it as “a sensual self-love ritual” and “a sacred queer text.” Its success established THE EROTIC PROJECT as both artistic movement and publishing experiment, literature as sanctuary, softness as survival.

FEEL: From Literature to Lived Practice ~

How do you FEEL?

This can be a tough question to answer.

Costello's new erotica offering, the FEEL Erotic Prompt Deck, invites you to feel deeper. Created by primarily queer artists for pleasure and catharsis, FEEL is a conduit for collective liberation. It is a comprehensive healing-arts, trauma-informed literary product that invites full-body expression, intimate self-study, and relational care.

We are living through uneasy times that lead us toward disconnection, burnout, and even violence. Collective work is necessary to heal. To do that work well, we must integrate restorative rest, pleasure, and play into our lives. FEEL aids in identifying and destigmatizing our deepest emotions and desires to heal and thrive. It invites us to feel through and heal through the trauma of our times, together.

The deck contains 104 guided prompts divided between SOLO and SHARED cards, labeled “Mental Health” and “Sexual Health.” Each card is inspired by a four-letter word, echoing Costello's fiber practice of silk graffiti and text-on-fabric. Co-designed, written, and edited by Aubrié Costello with contributions from Numa Perrier, Raquel Salas Rivera, Dáe Lee, OwlRare, and Arien Wilkerson, FEEL functions as both art object and accessible wellness resource. It transforms the act of reading and writing into a restorative ritual. FEEL was designed by Costello and Nick Vicente in Philadelphia and is produced ethically.

“I am a queer visual artist, creative and film director, writer, curator, and activist who has worked in Philadelphia, PA for 20 years. My practice is rooted in community collaboration and mutual care, weaving together fiber art, film, performance, installation, music, writing, and other multimedia forms to create soft safe spaces where people can gather, reflect, practice mindfulness, and be seen with dignity.

I'm the creator of THE EROTIC PROJECT.

THE EROTIC PROJECT creates intimate opportunities + considered spaces to be fully seen as one is now + to see one another with the utmost care, respect, attentiveness, + dignity.

At the core of my work is the belief that art is a vehicle for community engagement. through careful listening and with lots of care, I respond to my collaborators’ desires and the environments’ needs before I begin making.

I treat my practice as part of the healing-arts, offering projects and opportunities that create communal space for mental health care, vulnerability, catharsis, and collective expression. I strive to design safe, intentional environments where people can rediscover themselves and one another, and where collective voices, especially BIPOC, AAPI, LGBTQIA2S+ and other marginalized folks’ narratives can be deeply felt, amplified, humanized, and prioritized.” -Aubrié

WE ARE THE EROTIC PROJECT

Ursula Rucker・Alicia DeLarge・Amina El Kabbany・Vernon Jordan III ・Che Che Luna・Eileen Tran・Taylor Galloway・Luna Maye・Arien Wilkerson・OwlRare・Monique Ruffin・John Dionisio・Jess Noel・Mia Moretti・Dáe Lee・Raquel Salas Rivera・Allis Chang・Fatima Adamu-Goode・Symone Salib・Candy Alexandra González・Shanina Dionna・Numa Perrier・Frankie Shaw・Kingsley Ibeneche・AnnonXL / SILAH・Lendl Tellington・Brae Howard・Rosie Simmons・Keiko El・Moon Johnson・Keylah Mellon・Tyler Borchardt・KkCo・Kara Jubin・Nick Vicente・maximiliano・Cheyenne Gil・Guillermo Cassar・Alan Aldana・Lou Badger・Ayinde Kwaku Purnell + MORE

AUBRIÉ COSTELLO is a queer visual artist, creative & film director, writer, and curator of multimedia collaborations in Philadelphia, PA. Their collaborative projects amalgamate fi ber art, photography, fi lm, fashion, original music, literary/performance/installation art, and community care. They explore, depict and celebrate their creative collaborators’ unique experiences through varied media. They are co-creating artful resources and safe spaces for their community members to rediscover vulnerability, express themselves fully, and be seen with dignity. They chronicle the often unseen, intimate moments, and nuanced emotions experienced within our most personal relationships with self and others. The intention behind their work is to create experiences which encourage community engagement, interaction, self refection, self-love, and thoughtful collaboration.

Their work centers BIPOC AAPI LGBTQIA2S+ narratives.

Costello’s oeuvre is rooted in accessible, large-scale text-based fiber art installations called “silk graffiti" in public spaces. As a visual artist, Costello creates tangible fiber art objects and costumes featuring poignant silk graffiti text which reflects and conveys a particular, often shared, moment in time. The objects exist as props for collaborators to wear and interact with, then transform into curios which they later repurpose, reconfigure, and reutilize in site-specific installations and live experiences. Costello has expanded into the roles of creative director and film director, envisioning and producing multidisciplinary work, specifically films, performances, and literary projects. They invite creative contributors to infuse their craft(s) and perspective(s) into each collaboration. These works across art forms center the robust, vital, resonating queer stories of their collaborators, and further contextualize the silk words by investigating the meaning and impact of the text on the body and in space.

Costello's work explores the tension between what’s kept private versus what’s shared publicly and investigates how, when our private emotions are revealed in safe spaces with care, transparency, and without shame, opportunities to more deeply understand ourselves, one another, and our interconnectedness present themselves. These understandings could yield mindful, holistic consideration and collective mutual care, resulting in a more honest, equitable, and abundant society. Costello's work surveys softness as resistance and softness as protest of the internalized hardening and desensitization we continually learn and habitually exhibit. Their work is an offering to explore the value and transformative power of vulnerability, softness, gentleness, and eroticism beyond only the sexual, and how each can act as a conduit for our collective healing from the consistent harm and trauma we’re navigating.

Costello has exhibited their work extensively in Philadelphia and abroad, most notably at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Asian Arts Initiative, Philadelphia City Hall, Fairmount Water Works, Philadelphia International Airport, International House University of Pennsylvania, Chemical Heritage Foundation (now Science History Institute), Moore College of Art & Design, Main Line Arts Center, Bucks County Community College Hicks Art Center Gallery, The James Oliver Gallery, Projects Gallery, in politically and socially charged exhibitions Truth To Power, Into Action and WE RISE in Philadelphia, Los Angeles, & Chicago. Costello was a co-organizer of the 2017 citywide public art project, Signs Of Solidarity, and is a co-founder of anonymous public art curatorial collective Group X. Costello's work was featured in all 10 episodes of SMILF S2 on Showtime. Their self-published SOFT Book & their latest literary offering, the FEEL Deck, are currently on view & stocked at Ulises + etc,etc in Philadelphia and Other Nature in Berlin, Germany. The FEEL Deck is also featured in all suites and the AWAY Spa at W Philadelphia luxury hotel.

CONNECT:

ilysm@theeroticproject.com