Founded in 1980 by German born Benedikt Taschen, Taschen publishing began as a comic book publishing company due to his extensive collection of comics. Today Taschen has evolved to become an art book publishing company known for making lesser-seen art available to mainstream consumers. Innovative yet controversial, Taschen published volumes are not for the faint of heart due to their inclusion of fetish imagery, homosexually themed art, historical erotica and pornography.