The Hinala Gallery on Santa Fe, held a successful gallery opening last weekend for artist Terrilyn Moore. The show featured many provocative and interesting exhibits, one of which was the Pussy Project 100, a scandalous exhibit showcasing paintings of female genitalia.

The atmosphere of the gallery made it seem more like a party in a downtown apartment than a gallery opening. There were a range of sexes, sexualities and dress; nothing was off limits or veiled at this exhibition.

Moore based these intimate and explicit portraits on photographs of local women who posed for this particular exhibit as well as personal questionnaires completed by all the models. Moore’s warm, inviting personality no doubt put the women at ease while they posed, though she said the women varied quite a bit as to how nervous or comfortable they were.

“Women are so different. I had to learn different styles to represent them accurately,” Moore said.

Moore employed different techniques with each of the 100 pieces. Though most were paintings, there were several mixed media portraits. Some of the images were accompanied by poems written on black paper with silver marker. Various paintings represented the classic flower metaphor, which was not as creative as some of her other renditions of the women. She incorporated feathers, ribbons, sequins and other collage-type materials to enhance and define the different portraits. The difference in color schemes was also noticeable, some with vibrant, rich, textured colors, others with soft pastels and others still with cooler blues and greens.

“Every single woman made me grow. I had to investigate and experiment with different mediums,” Moore said.

Three years ago at the “Vagina Monologues” at the Auraria campus here in Denver, Moore saw several works similar to the type she exhibited last Friday and thought to herself, “I could do that.”

Moore started with students who volunteered for the portrait and the word spread from there. She worked with all types of women including doctors, lawyers and waitresses, all from Denver. She found that after the women posed, they all expressed feeling more comfortable with their sexuality. In fact, most of the women told Moore they were able to recognize themselves from her portraits, some of which were fairly abstract.

Although the subject matter of the portraits is somewhat taboo, the exhibit is one that should not be missed by any art lover or novice.

The exhibit will be showing for the rest of February at the Hinala Gallery