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Sunday, June 20, 1999
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal
THE LOUVRE OF LIBIDO
No lawmakers have to deal with tax breaks for an `art collection'
that claims to be dedicated to the world's oldest profession.
By Jane Ann Morrison
Review-Journal
A mutt named Pierre welcomed two recent visitors from Las Vegas to the Brothel Art Museum in the community of Crystal, a hamlet 25 miles north of Pahrump that otherwise seems to exist for two purposes only -- to serve alcohol and deliver sex.
We were there for the art.
For years, a hard-to-miss billboard in Pahrump has advertised the Brothel Art Museum as "the only museum of its kind in the world!"
Having seen the Bellagio Gallery of Fine Art, it was time to leave the Impressionists and expand our understanding of art in another direction.
Would there be lines or would they take reservations?
Would owner/collector Joe Richards have an in-depth commentary on tape so we could understand the nuances and his passion for his collection, much like the Bellagio's Steve Wynn?
Would we even find it?
To get there, we drove 69 miles from Las Vegas before seeing the billboard giving directions to the free museum, yet another 25 miles further north on state Route 160. The placard features a red-haired woman with bare shoulders, drawn in an art nouveau style that hints that yes, there is art in the museum.
Despite advance warning from Harry Ford of the Pahrump Museum that the Brothel Art Museum is just a come-on for the brothels in Crystal, a marketing tool to snare visitors under the guise of cultural purposes, we ventured on.
The Brothel Art Museum lines the wall of a bar adjacent the old Cherry Patch Ranch Brothel, which closed nine years ago.
A couple of whorehouses and a massage parlor exist behind the museum, but remember, this was an art-seeking expedition.
The sign said the museum was open but the lone car out front suggested we wouldn't be able to find anonymity among throngs of other art lovers.
Pierre, whose short legs offered clues about his half-dachshund heritage, looked happy to see museum-seekers.
Inside, so did his master, bartender Kevin Kerns -- it would be a stretch to call him a museum curator -- who chatted about the collection that, just like the Bellagio's $300 million artwork, disappoints some, and rivets others.
The Brothel Art Museum is promoted nationwide. Kerns, who has worked there since June 1997, described one East Coast patron who came out solely to see the attraction.
Kerns said the man looked around and declared: "I can't believe I came all the way out from Pennsylvania to see this crap."
Yet others spend as long as 90 minutes perusing the collection.
At first, the display seems a little lacking.
The initial shock: There's nothing sexy about it.
Mostly, it's hundreds of old newspaper clips shellacked and mounted on wood.
There's also a skeleton without hands named Agnes. Local lore is she was a thief and had her hands cut off as punishment. Kerns, 38, told the story, but then admitted Agnes in all likelihood served as a cadaver for medical students.
Photos lining the walls are of Hollywood stars and country-western singers, not hookers. A moose head doesn't seem to advance the brothel theme.
A small runway ramp juts out, but isn't used. Kerns said a brief foray into nude dancing was halted when community members feared dancers might be seen through the windows by children riding by in school buses.
During the art tour, Kerns explains a few things to the uninformed, such as the difference between brothels in Crystal, a community of about 60 souls who either work at the brothels, the Nevada Test Site or are retired, and brothels where the prostitutes mingle in the bar with customers.
The brothels behind the museum -- Mabel's and the Cherry Patch Ranch Brothel -- are parlor-type brothels, he said, where the bar is separate from the brothel. A woman/tourist/art lover can have a drink there.
The brothels have seven or eight prostitutes working at slow times or as many as 20 to 25 at busy times, which tend to be spring and fall and particularly during three big conventions in Las Vegas -- Comdex, the Consumer Electronics Show and the National Association of Broadcasters.
Free limousine service takes customers from Las Vegas to the remote legal brothels where the women are checked weekly for disease. While illegal prostitutes are available in Las Vegas, customers trek to rural brothels because of fear they'll be caught up in an undercover vice sting, Kerns said.
Although the brothels are open 24 hours for their customers' shopping convenience, the busy times are between 4 and 6 p.m. when men are getting off work, and then again around 10 p.m.
"The girls are on call 24 hours a day. I have to respect the girls for that. They have more stamina than I do," Kerns said.
Souvenirs from the brothels are displayed in a glass-enclosed case in the museum, but to buy them, customers have to go to another bar next to the brothels behind the museum.
On sale are menus for services and T-shirts advertising Mabel's Whorehouse, "where quality keeps them coming."
Just behind the museum and before the dirt road reaches the brothels are rows of trailers where the women live during the three weeks each month they're working at the brothel.
Pointing the way to the brothels is a worn-looking statue of an ever-young showgirl standing and waving her arms in front of the old Cherry Patch Ranch Brothel. A sign points to the left and declares "Go down the street for service."
The dirt road leads to Madam Butterfly's massage parlor, Mabel's Whorehouse, the new Cherry Patch Ranch Brothel and another bar.
Cottontail rabbits bounce forward in friendly greeting, hoping for a handout. A "Limo Parking Only" sign protects a patch of dirt in front of the brothels.
It's 8 o'clock on a Saturday night and the air smells of Chinese food.
The only people inside the brothel's bar are a bartender and an older woman eating dinner from a Styrofoam box who leaves as soon as two art aficionados enter.
A $5 beer and $5 Diet Pepsi are served by a chatty bartender who answers some questions and professes not to know the answers to others.
Like how much sex costs.
The girls are individual contractors and negotiate their own prices, he explained.
Once a customer selects a prostitute from the parlor line-up, they go back to their room for whatever activity at whatever price for whatever time.
Back at the museum, there are a few paintings but only one is advertised for sale -- a depiction of Mike Tyson boxing that carries a $4,000 price tag. Kerns said he wouldn't pay $4 for it, but that's because of his disdain over Tyson chomping Evander Holyfield's ear.
The museum doesn't have anything -- photos, portraits, drawings -- depicting scarlet women. Coming closest to that theme is a series of Western poster-size playing cards Kerns said he thought one of the girls drew.
The real emphasis is on the newspaper clips that focus on three topics: brothels, crimes at brothels and political figures. A few oddities break out of those three themes.
Political posters seem somehow out of place. Nye County sheriffs and district attorneys are featured, but in one corner, there's Ann Richards, former governor of Texas. Is she there for some particular reason or because she and the owner share the same last name?
Why is there an old photo of five Nevada Supreme Court justices in the museum?
A 1988 letter from Steve Wynn, then the chief executive officer of the Golden Nugget, has a place in the museum.
In it, he asks Nevada legislators to ban legalized prostitution. "The point is, it is not good for Nevada's image to have wide-open, legalized cat houses and the sooner we put that image behind us, the better," Wynn wrote. His letter didn't move the Nevada Legislature to change its laws, which permit legalized brothels in the less populous counties, although not in Clark County.
Then suddenly the newspapers did seem more like art.
Blue headlines about the 1978 burning of the Chicken Ranch brothel in Pahrump were on the wall, authored by Jane Ann Morrison, shining under shellack.
I'm art.
But I'm not special.
All kinds of stories from present and former reporters from the Review-Journal, the Las Vegas Sun, the Pahrump Valley Times and the Reno Gazette-Journal line the walls. The only photos of prostitutes are in those stories.
Kerns, who lost one leg because of complications from diabetes, said the museum is never crowded. "Ten people would be a big crowd."
His busiest night is Tuesday, he said, pausing to be asked: Why Tuesday?
"Because the Short Branch is closed," he said referring to the closest other nonbrothel bar in Crystal.
The museum and bar get anywhere from four people to 20 people a day, Kerns said. Some are tourists and some are regular customers who come in for a drink.
"But I've sat here for six hours straight and never seen a soul," he said.
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Printable version of this story
Kevin Kerns and his dog, Pierre, above, welcome visitors to the Brothel Art Museum, a bar and museum adjacent to the old Cherry Patch Brothel. The Cherry Patch has been moved farther away from the road, but the showgirl statue shows the way to find it.
Photo by John Gurzinski.
For years, this billboard, top photo, in Pahrump has urged people to visit the Brothel Art Museum, 25 miles down the road in the community of Crystal.
Photo by John Gurzinski.
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