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Tie Me Up, Nawashi

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Once a month, however, the Lifestyle Alternative Centre hosts the Photo Artisans Guild (PAG), "and their photographers and models crave attention," he says. The meeting functions as a contemporary extension of an amateur camera club. On a clear, nearly nippy January night, more than a dozen photographers, makeup artists, and models have arrived, including Tatu, Lochai, Janice, Pixel (a 20-year-old photographer and model from Alaska), and Don, AKA Quietmaster, a retired professional photographer who looks to be in his 70s.

Lochai helps run the PAG along with the LAC's founders, Jeff and Keiki Weigel. The center takes great pains to distance itself from swingers clubs, fetish dungeons, or the like. No alcohol is served, just pop and pizza. Everyone assembled is white and well-off, like Deiter, an architect and amateur photo buff.

Lochai tries to make clear what the Photo Artisans Guild isn't: "It's not a place of pornography or sexual shooting — it's a venue for fine art. We're here to create artistic material — not for websites charging money. You're not going to have people fucking in here. It's not what PAG is about."

Smoking a cigarette behind the facility, Deiter agrees. "I'm here for pure motives of creativity and expression," he insists. "Not anything perverted — it's about the art." Deiter was taking a rope-bondage class from Jimi Tatu when he noticed the photographs in the front hallway and became curious about PAG.

Quietmaster whips out a black notebook-folder and a dog-eared magazine, its cover adorned with a photograph of Bettie Page leaning against an old car. One summer afternoon in the late '50s, Don and a group of photographers were in upstate New York shooting a group of lingerie models at an old farmhouse. A camera club similar to tonight's PAG shoot, no one had any idea of the risque status Page would later attain. "If I had known," Don says, "I wouldn't have shot anyone else."

That one day is his claim to fame. "You shot Bettie!" the other photographers say in amazement. "Doesn't make me a good photographer," Don shrugs. "Just means I was in the right place at the right time."

Piercings, shaved cootches, and tattoos have replaced Bettie's relative innocence, Don notes, but he still loves it all. His folder is full of photos of comely young models he's shot at the center. The models who come to PAG, Lochai explains, are paid with photo CDs or prints from the session. Many of those he's photographing will show up in his newest book, Kirinawa: Rope Cut for a Certain Purpose.

Stasha has driven all the way down from Kissimmee tonight just to be tied up by and among a room full of people she's never met.

With three women hovering around her doing her makeup and Lochai's genteel professionalism, she's feeling at ease. Within a few minutes of speaking to her, Lochai has got her taking off her T-shirt (which reads "Skinny Little Bitch") and her sweatpants, revealing tattoos, pierced-nipples, surgically enhanced breasts, and a pair of tiny black panties.

"This is four-strand hemp rope, just to give you an idea," Lochai says, offering it to her for inspection. A techno song starts pumping from a portable stereo. He takes one of Stasha's arms and starts to lace it against her thigh.

"If at any point something hurts," he says, "tell me. How do you feel?"

"I feel great," she answers.

"Good," Lochai says. "I want you to be stoic. I want confidence. Do you have to wear your panties?"

"I don't have to," she says, removing them and revealing another tattoo straddling her mons. Lips pursed in concentration, Lochai continues tying Stasha up in a freeform style that isn't very constricting but is visually appealing. "This is good exposure for me," she says, "good publicity. And it's really a turn-on, even though usually I'm the one in control."

Don walks up, takes a series of shots from every conceivable angle. "You should be on a red Ferrari!" he tells Stasha. "Sounds good," she replies, the faintest hint of a smile crossing her glossy lips.

Deiter scopes out the best spot for a shot. Around 10 p.m., Don packs up his equipment, thanks Stasha, and bids adieu. The nude, bound beauty waves goodbye with her one free hand.

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