TEMPTRESS 6 / SOFTIES

This cover story features Softies, a photographic project by John Yonatan Jacoby — portraying beautiful young men in cakes and haute couture, questioning why what is desired in the dark is punished in daylight. The narrative is accompanied by an essay from Jacoby, delving deeper into themes of desire, and shame, exposing the tensions between visibility and repression.

Money never shows up clean. It comes with desire, shame, hunger, contracts, fantasies, and a silence that says more than any bank statement. TEMPTRESS — the independent art platform and print magazine founded by Ukrainian artist Julie Poly — dedicates its sixth issue to following money into the places where it gets uncomfortable: bedrooms and strip clubs, legal brothels and dating apps, oligarch summits and bedroom altars, rooftops in Rio and night streets in Warsaw.

The issue features an exclusive interview with Santiago Sierra, conducted by Dasha Anosova, alongside a conversation Anastasiia Kalyta with filmmaker Erika Lust — plus essays, photo series, confessions, and experiments from 25+ contributors spanning Kyiv, Berlin, London, São Paulo, New York, Vienna, Warsaw, and beyond.

This issue includes a special insert for the babes: scented stickers created in collaboration with JOUISSANCE perfumes and TEMPTRESS. Extending beyond the page, the insert connects olfactory experience to one of the essays in the issue, where scent becomes an entry point intо memory and desire.