I once posed naked, one of the university papers here was looking for people for an issue about sex.
I thought about it, and realized that if someone recognized me, it might be a good thing. Theyâd have to admit looking. But I was also around 34 at the time.
But it was odd. I felt like the photographer was doing me a favor, a chance to be bold. And I realized I was most uncomfortable when she was looking through the camera, which meant I wasnât sure where she was looking.
Iâm not sure I felt vulnerable, but it was a passive role, being naked while she had her clothes on. Women often are portrayed that way, but men less often. And for men to be naked like that, it often seems to suggest being in control.
I found this post much more interesting than the video or book concept, which is yet another depiction of women of a given age and body type in the same role of passive nudity that you described. Thanks for sharing.
The closest I ever got was posing for the flyer advertising our senior art exhibition because nobody else in my class was willing to do it. I think the girl behind the camera was more embarrassed than I was.
As I get older I just donât give a shit anymore if people see me naked. Iâve never posed nude on purpose but after several stints in the hospital with those pitiful gowns I lost all sense of modesty.
Same goes for the locker room - while the teenagers are desperately trying to change underneath a towel I just let it all hang out. I figure that I donât really wish to see them and they sure as hell donât want to see me, so why care?
Interesting topic. Many of my college friends were artists, and they drew nude models in class every week. I was kind of stunned to learn itâs just a job, and also to learn most of the models werenât pretty. I was disappointed.
Artists generally learn to draw people in the nude before learning to draw them clothed because itâs easier to draw a clothed person if you have a basic understanding of whatâs going on underneath all that fabric.
In fact many figure drawing classes start with models that are even MORE nude:
thereâs hundreds of drawings of me out there (probably in the landfill at this point, lol.)
I used to pose for the life drawing classes at my uni for extra money. my mom wasnât a nudist, but she was a hippie type and an artist, so the human body was never stigmatized to me. I was also majoring in art at the timeâit didnât dawn on me that all the other models were not in uni or in other curricula; I was modelling for a bunch of people I knew and/or at least saw around the building. Maybe that was awkward for them, but I couldnât be bothered. I mean, Iâm playing it off as cool but that probably points to being âsocially blindâ on some level. In the end, it didnât seem to matter much.
I wish I had a few of those drawings, though.
âWe human beings are paradoxes of lust and awe, blood and psychology. We crash into each other, we slip against each other. It is impossible not to react.â
Itâs a giant artist statement created as a kickstarter! This guy is good at taking nudes, but he is brilliant at marketing!
Yeah. Iâm 39. Fuck it. I figure in another 30 years Iâll be one of those weird old dudes just hanging out naked at the Y.
I like a naked woman about as much as you possibly can and Iâm generally in favor of sexualzed nudity. But I have to say that having kids has greatly changed my view of nudity. Theyâre young (4 & 6), and I bathe them every night. Iâm in awe of how perfect and beautiful they are. I was never comfortable naked as a child (Nekkid, actually. Iâm from the south). I blame my fatness and my bible-thumping, conservative family. It wasnât until I was in my 20s that I became comfortable with my body. So itâs interesting for me to see how completely at ease my kids are with their own bodies. I donât want them to turn into exhibitionists or anything, but I hope they maintain that comfort with their physical selves.
Isnât that the real key to modern art? Convincing someone that whatever conceptual crap theyâve made up is âartâ, even though it may exhibit the technical skills of of a 5 year old?
Definitely not! I would say that the biggest failings I encounter in art, media, entertainment, etc is the pervasive notion that it somehow matters how many people like what you do. Trying to appeal to people strikes me as always a deeply insecure gesture, and I think this undermines the deeper motivations of why such works demonstrate the need to exist for their own sake.
The irony is that being an egotistical person looking for attention and validation is a very common and banal outlook - yet people keep doing it, and hoping to impress with it. Unfortunately, there isnât anything particularly modern about this. The key to art is that it needs to be made, regardless of what anybody thinks about it.
Ooooo! We havenât had a âWhat is Art?â thread for a while.
Yeah, about that, much of my favorite art got made because it was commissioned based on pleasing the client.
I am not sure that we are having one now, either! My remarks were about the motivations behind artistic work, rather than what content, form, or technique it might embody.
But can it be certain that this is true causation - as to say, that it would not have been made for any other reasons, under any other circumstances? There is not anything wrong with favor, money, pleasure, or survival in and of themselves - so long as one is ambivalent about them, rather than allowing them to motivate oneself as a personal problem. Compared to artistic impulse or enriching society, pleasing a person for their patronage sounds like a stereotypically fickle motivation for any sort of worthwhile undertaking. I am happy if some people have made the best of those circumstances, but I am very skeptical about regarding them as being essentially necessary.
Iâve never posed nude, but the spas around here are basically all mixed gender and âTextilfreiâ. Unlike clothing optional places that Iâve heard about it the US, itâs certainly not just old people who go. While people generally put on a towel when walking between areas, itâs kind of nice to spend a few hours in an environment where nobody has anything to hide. (I mean, some couples are a little too open about their feelings for each other, but most people are pretty relaxed).
We havenât had a âwhat is @popobawa4u really sayingâ thread for a while either. I refer you to the chair .gif 
I just decided to ignore the opening salvo; popo, on the other handâŚ
I had a drawing class in high school where we had a skeleton to draw.
I used to make it talk to the people in my group.
Later I found out, it was real, because artificial skeletons cost more money to manufacture than to just take one from a med school cadaver.
That made it much more amusing. At the time, anyways. I am an adult now.
