No Excess Baggage

Sex has so much baggage. And while we place some of that baggage onto sex artificially, there will always be a certain amount that legitimately comes with the territory. Sex is messy. Sex tugs at people's heartstrings. Sex can carry health risks. And in certain couplings, sex carries the risk of pregnancy. Which is a big deal.

I'm open-minded, but I don't want to have or be surrounded by people having indiscriminate sex all the time. That's why I support people being able to be naked together absent a sexual context - i.e., nudism. But sometimes nudism takes it too far in de-emphasizing sexuality, to a point where it no longer even matters what people look like, and it's almost considered a sin to admire another person's body.

I want to spend time admiring people's bodies. Attractive people. As little dressed as possible. I feel like this is so hard to find - looking, for the sake of looking, without the expectation of a sexual coupling (and the frustrations, on both sides, when that turns out not to be a mutual goal). I mean, sure, we do it all the time, but we have to hide our intentions, and you can never get enough of an eyeful without either committing to a sexual relationship, or coming off as a total creep.

That's why I like art - the exhibition of aesthetic beauty, for viewing without further commitment - and why I support, as nudism does, a culture where nudity isn't treated as an invitation to sex. I just don't want to lose the part where we get to experience delight at the sight of the human body. Because it gives me so much pleasure in life, and it's a harmless joy (paradoxically feared by so many people) that I never feel I can get quite enough of.

To summarize, in a textile culture, you don't get to see people naked unless you're in a sexual relationship. In a nudist environment, you can see people naked but you're not allowed to enjoy the view. I'm just looking for the middle ground, where we can appreciate naked beauty - even for its erotic appeal - yet without comitting to a sexual relationship.

Unnatural

Human nature makes a lot more sense when you consider that man is just another animal driven by instinct. Civilization is, largely, a positive influence, but exposure to it tends to foster the illusion that it is the norm rather than the exception.

So, I was talking to a person who enjoys the conjunction of nudism and swinging (a taboo subject among conventional nudists), and I was struggling to formulate a response that is respectful of nudism, yet neither hollowly dogmatic nor judgmental of an open and unrestrained approach to sexuality (which I support - in principle; it's much harder to put into practice). How do you tell someone who likes walking around naked in front of strangers and openly having sex, that walking around naked is perfectly natural, but openly having sex is not? I mean, isn't that pretty much our prime directive?

And I came to a conclusion. What if nudism isn't natural, after all? I mean, the kind of nudism that's just as buttoned up (maybe more so) as textiles are on the subject of sex. Sure, it's perfectly natural to walk around naked without draping man-made fabrics over our bodies to preserve a completely arbitrary sense of dignity. But what if it's also perfectly natural for people to constantly be having loads of sex, out in the open, with multiple partners? Speaking in an evolutionary sense, our sex drives are a powerful instinct. There may be risks inherent to indiscriminate sexual activity, but you can't argue that nature favors the "spray and pray" method. It's civilization that seeks to dampen this wanton sexual behavior.

Now, I believe in the merits of civilization. And I think we should be more discriminate in who and how we fuck. I'm ruled by the complex intelligence of my brain, not solely by my baser instincts. But the fact remains, it may be no more natural to pretend that we shouldn't be fucking around all the time than it is to pretend there's any good reason to wear clothes. This would explain an awful lot of the difficulty nudism has trying to convince the world that naked people hanging out doesn't automatically carry a sexual connotation, and why it seems (to non-nudists and sexual progressives alike) so hypocritical on its face for nudists to go to the trouble of shattering the nudity taboo but then come to the decision to still preserve our taboos around sex.

Let me state this clearly. I believe in the non-sexual version of nudism. I support it, and I actually prefer it to the alternative (which is a nude-friendly swingers' lifestyle - and why wouldn't swingers be nude-friendly?). But let's not kid ourselves into thinking it's natural or even obvious. And let's stop getting endlessly frustrated with the multitudes of people who get it wrong. That's like figuring out calculus and letting every person who never got past algebra drive you up the wall. Accept that this misunderstanding is, by necessity, going to be widespread, and then work on trying to correct people with more patience and empathy, instead of writing off everyone who ever gets it wrong as an idiot or an enemy. Most people alive don't get as much sex as the force of natural evolution (and their appetite) intends. So let's give them a break.

Undercarriage (An Artistic Exception)

Every so often, while I'm bent over combing my hair out after a shower, I'll get a glimpse of myself in the mirror we have propped up in the bathroom, and the sight will catch my eye. I find it particularly intriguing, for whatever reason, when my genitalia is hanging extra low. Such an important part of my anatomy, so seemingly tenuously attached to my body!

[description: a bent torso is shown from behind, genitals dangling low]

It is a prurient sight, perhaps, but I'm not trying to photograph it in a vulgar manner, which would be all too easy to do. I just find it an interesting view, as a photographer of the human body, from an artistic and even scientific perspective, almost more so than a sexual one. The simple fact is, you don't usually get to see this angle because of our gymnophobic attitudes and sexual taboos.

Now, if we're being honest, not everyone looks good from this angle - not even I look good from this angle every single time. But I groom myself and photograph myself with the intent to create artistic bodyscapes that look pleasing enough to eat dinner off of. And when I accomplish that goal, there isn't a single reason in the world that adequately justifies preventing me from sharing that view with interested others. And (contrary to the specious "nobody wants to see that" argument) there are, always, interested others - if you know where to look.

Nude Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness

Speaking on a purely hypothetical level, let's say I'm at a public park, and the weather is pleasant, and I decide I would be more comfortable if I stripped naked. I'm not harassing anybody, I'm just minding my own business, the way I'm most comfortable. My question is this: is there any Constitutional basis that would justify the restriction of my freedom to do so? Would my choice to disrobe fundamentally threaten the life, liberty, or pursuit of happiness of another? Let's consider these one at a time. Would taking my clothes off threaten anybody's life? No. Would it restrict anybody's liberty? Not unless you define liberty very broadly to include the "liberty" to recreate in parks "free from" the sight of nudity. But if you look closely, this isn't really liberty at all, it's a restriction of liberty. Finally, could stripping nude in a public park negatively affect somebody else's happiness? Certainly. But does it limit their ability to pursue happiness? No. If they're unhappy, they can pick their feet up and go somewhere else.

[description: a man strips nude in a public park]

Now let's turn the tables. If you take away my option to enjoy nude recreation in public parks, are you threatening my life? Of course not. But are you restricting my liberty? Absolutely! I should be the one to control how I dress myself. Obviously, you're limiting my happiness, but are you limiting my ability to pursue happiness? Not in the broadest sense, where even a prisoner digging a hole with a spoon could be considered to be working towards the promise (no matter how unlikely) of a happier state of living - like hope, one can pursue anything with the right mindset, no matter how dire conditions are. The truth is, I can always search for another place to be nude. But if this kind of restriction on my liberty is applied across the board, then that leaves me little recourse. Except to petition the government, I suppose. But at what point does continuously tossing obstacles in my path add up to actively obstructing my pursuit of happiness?

What happens when we weigh these two sides against each other? It's clear that nobody's life is being threatened either by nude recreation or its restriction thereof. On the liberty issue, I don't think there exists a credible argument to refute the fact that preventing people from recreating nude significantly restricts individual liberty, in a way that permitting them to do so does not. Which brings us to the pursuit of happiness, in all its vague and indeterminate glory. I think in either case, avenues exist for a person to pursue happiness. But the way I see it, restricting a person's liberty to recreate nude hampers his pursuit of happiness in a more direct and substantial way than permitting that person to recreate nude would hamper the pursuit of happiness of somebody else who wants to control what other people wear at the park. It comes right back to liberty - if your happiness depends on restricting other people's liberties, then that's a less valid concern than that of the person whose happiness simply depends on having liberty.

[description: a man strips nude in a public park]

Obviously, the world disagrees with me on this point. I think a rational analysis of the facts supports my conclusion that a person should be allowed to recreate nude in a public park if they so choose. The reality is simply that not enough people would care to. To most people, nudism is a foreign concept, and one that's frankly quite scary. The reason, then, that it is restricted to the extent that it is, is simply a matter of habit and popular opinion, and not social justice. But then, that's the way the world works. Justice isn't a naturally occurring phenomenon. It's a human concept. We strive towards it, sometimes. But only when it's comfortable and convenient for a majority of the population.

Q: Why do you call yourself an exhibitionist?

A: On a personal level, a large part of my sex-positive platform hinges on an insistence on re-envisioning what constitutes exhibitionism. So you might ask, if my experience of exhibitionism doesn't match the stereotype, then why do I call myself an exhibitionist? Well, other than the fact that this is a great opportunity to highlight and combat the way we tend to stereotype and "other" people we don't understand - especially when sex is involved - as with everyone else, sexual identity tends to be something you discover, more so than something you deliberately construct.

I didn't set out to champion the cause of exhibitionism when I entered the world of nude photography. Truth be told, I spent a lot of my life self-conscious about my body, and a lot of time in those early days as a nude model being mortified of sharing my images, out of a fear of negative judgment. I did it because I had a passion for the art form, and an admiration for the human body. If I'd had the opportunity, I would have shot images of beautiful naked women. But due to a social handicap, I was forced to limit myself to self-portraiture.

I've told this story before, but my whole journey as an artist grew out of looking back on sexting pics I shot (of myself) for my girlfriend in high school. I liked the pics, I enjoyed the process of taking them, and I had the distinct impression that it was unfair that only one person in the world (besides myself) should ever get a chance to see them. That's why I started sharing them, and that's how I got started taking more. What happened from there is that I developed an appreciative audience. I continued to enjoy the process, and there were people out there who liked the results. Over the years, I gained confidence and experience, and I groomed myself to be an even more eye-catching model, until nude self-portraiture became a fundamental part of my life and identity.

Because I was lucky enough to be "reared" as an artist in a permissive environment, and because my self-portraiture has always been an independent activity, there were never any artificial boundaries erected between nudity and eroticism, and nothing stopped me from exploring both through my photography - except my own embarrassment at first, which was gradually eroded as, again, I acquired an appreciative, even enthusiastic, audience for such works. If at any point I was uncomfortable with sexually explicit media, I would have stopped producing it. Instead, I found it to be an enjoyable activity. And I also found sharing it with an appreciative audience to be empowering, but not just that - it was also exciting.

I'm pretty sure getting excited by expressing your sexuality (especially visually) in front of random strangers on the internet counts as exhibitionism. Not everybody gets off on that. It just so happens that I do.* As do so many others. It's liberating, living in a sexually repressive culture, to be able to express yourself sexually and be appreciated (not shamed) for it. Moreover, as somebody with a social handicap and no strong interest to have intimate relationships with lots of people, this is a way that I can be sexually adventurous with very little (indeed, practically nonexistent) danger to myself or others. It has nothing to do with "accosting" people on the street, and everything to do with indulging in consensual kink with other voyeurs, as well as exploring, conceptually - through art - the excitement that can come from being naked or encountering nudity (whether or not that involves any sexual behavior whatsoever) in places and situations that it's not normally expected in a gymnophobic culture.

*I didn't immediately put two and two together, but in retrospect, one of my earliest and strongest memories of my own sexual awakening involves frolicking nude in front of a camera.

And I think there are a lot of people out there like me, if the popularity of websites like OnlyFans are any indication. I want to support them and defend them, and be a voice for them. And for myself. And show the world that we are not a dirty stereotype that can be brushed aside, reduced to a DSM diagnosis, and treated as mere "perverts" rather than human beings with an ethical conscience, deserving of dignity and respect and the same rights and liberties everybody else gets.

[description: a nude figure holds a garden gate open while another nude figure stands in front of it]
The Illusion of Danger

This photo illustrates one of my points about exhibitionism and sexual fetishism in general. It is a clone shot depicting one nude figure opening the gate for another nude figure, who is standing - as revealed by the viewpoint in the second part of the diptych - in view of the street. As an exhibitionist, the idea of standing in front of that open gate excites me. I don't know why it excites me. I didn't choose for it to excite me. That's just how it makes me feel. And that's why I constructed that illusion in this photomanipulation.

I never actually stood naked in front of that open gate. The gate was closed when I stood in front of it, and when I held it open, I was always behind it, out of view of the street. But when I stitch the two images together, it looks like I'm standing there naked in view of the street. That's part of the "artifice" in art. And I'm explaining the trick because it demonstrates my point - namely, that you can find something sexually thrilling and still understand the logistical and ethical issues it raises, and maintain self-control even in the face of those feelings.

Being an exhibitionist isn't illegal or unethical or immoral, and neither does having those feelings predetermine a stereotypical pattern of antisocial behavior. You might even find perfectly acceptable outlets for those desires - like when I share images like this one with consenting (even enthusiastic!) voyeurs online.

The Voyeur's Exhibition

[description: a nude figure stands on furniture to peek out the window while another looks on]

This clone shot was conceived and completed all in the space of about an hour (with a pause in the middle for breakfast). I woke up to the noise of heavy machinery across the street, and stepped up on the furniture to take a peek out the window (covered on bottom for privacy, but open at top for natural light). As an artist who is my own muse, I often wonder how I look from a third person perspective, and I thought that this would be an interesting pose to photograph - so I did. There was some empty space in the frame, so I decided to throw in a clone.

It still amazes me how much of a taboo society puts on human genitalia. This is a beautiful portrait of the human body. You may or may not find it arousing (it's certainly fine if you do), but it's tasteful - not vulgar, or sexually explicit in any way. Why do certain parts of our bodies have this stigma, that they have to stay covered up all the time and hidden from general audiences? This isn't pornography. Yet we treat it as if it were.

Anyway, I think it's interesting that this is another in a long line of portraits from throughout my career that blurs the distinction between voyeurism and exhibitionism. I'm the one peeking out the window, curious to see what's going on outside, while staying hidden from view. Yet, I'm also the one who's naked - the thing voyeurs are typically on the lookout for. The fact that this whole situation (which really happened, I didn't make it up just for the shot) is being photographed and then shared with others makes it a wholly exhibitionist depiction of a voyeuristic situation - we're not seeing what the voyeur is seeing, we're seeing the voyeur.

I guess that's what happens when you're a nudist, but you're also an artist, and you understand the appeal of both voyeurism and exhibitionism. The really fun thing to imagine, though, is that this sort of thing might be going on when you're out on the street. That face in the window, almost wholly obscured by a curtain? That could be a naked person in there! And what's more, we always imagine (well, the prudes do) that it's some nosey old lady doing the snooping. But what if that naked person in there was actually attractive? It sounds like a fantasy, and the odds might be against it, but take it from a nude model who was in that very position just today - I'm telling you, it happens.

And as an artist, I make it my purpose to go the next step further, and show you. You're welcome.

Screen Capping

I hinted at this in an earlier post, but part of my photographic process as a self-portrait artist is to shoot short videos of myself doing the same sorts of things I would do while posing for pictures. Not so much in a behind-the-scenes way (honestly, I don't think there's anything especially interesting going on behind the scenes - the interesting part is what's in front of the camera - that's why I'm putting it in front of the camera), but to give my fans and followers a chance to see me in motion, which is more visceral than a still image, and one step closer to being there in person.

But in addition to sharing these videos, I like to review them and take screencaps of interesting moments. You might say this process is redundant, when fans will be able to view the video itself, and when I usually have similar photos taken of the same subject around the same time. But it serves an important purpose. As a self-portrait artist, I have many limitations, and one of them is not being able to watch while my subject poses, in order to pick out (or even direct) the poses that look good. Much of what I do is based on a combination of instinct and experience, derived from knowing my own body (through years of photographing it).

So, recording a video, and then reviewing it, allows me to simulate the experience of standing behind the camera and clicking the shutter (or in my case, the screencap button) while my model poses. But it also allows me to explore a more dynamic range of poses - especially action poses - in a shorter period of time than I could if I tried each one while taking a still image. And when I'm out shooting on location, getting naked in potentially risky areas, every second counts. If I only have, say, a minute to create some material before I have to get dressed and/or move along, then a short video will produce far more content than two or three still images created while running back and forth to the camera and waiting for the timer to count down.

I've front-loaded this post with all the advantages of the video screencapping process, because I want you to understand why I do (and continue to do) it. But what I really wanted to talk about are the disadvantages. Firstly, capturing a screenshot from a video yields a significantly lower resolution image than if I had taken a still image to start with. This is unfortunate, but I consider it a worthwhile sacrifice. I've always been more of an artistic photographer than a technical one - what matters is what's being pictured, not how crisp and clear the image is. Which is not to say that I wouldn't love to take technically stunning photographs, but I don't have thousands of dollars to drop on expensive lenses. And I'd rather make good art cheaply than give up on being an artist because I can't afford professional gear. Lucky for me, the camera(s) on an iPhone these days are pretty decent.

But the biggest drawback of the screencapping process is just how tedious it is. I can get up to a hundred captures or more from a video three or four minutes long. Naturally, I'll whittle those down to just the best dozen or two, in most cases. But that's still tens of images that need to be processed and watermarked (and images shot out in nature - which I take a lot of - are the most frustrating to watermark). Add to that the fact that I frequently shoot multiple videos when I'm out on location, and even just one day's haul of content can take a long time to process. That's why I have almost a whole summer's worth of content still unposted, even as another season is on the verge of starting.

I've said this before, but I enjoy the excitement and the adventure of going out on shoots more than the tedium of sitting in front of a computer processing images. I've toyed with the idea of going out to enjoy nude recreation without taking my camera along, but since my camera is also my phone, of course I'm going to take it - and I just can't seem to resist the temptation to photograph my activities. So the workload compounds upon itself. Perhaps I should just be a model, and let somebody else control the camera. But you see, I'm quite alone in the world of making nude art. Besides, I always wanted to be the photographer. I only started modeling because I had no one else to do it for me. There are all kinds of people who deserve to be modeling instead of me.

I hate to admit it, but it's not even just that the process takes so much time. If I sat down and powered through it, I could generate from one video a couple dozen images ready to be posted, in a matter of a few hours. But the going is monotonous, and when you have to repeat this process day after day, week after week, month after month, even year after year, I get burned out. It would be hard even if I were being paid a reasonable hourly wage. And while I have finally, after years of doing this, figured out a way to generate some modest income from it, it doesn't begin to approach minimum wage (even adjusted for part time work - imagine spreading just two weeks' salary over the course of a whole year). I continue to do it in spite of these facts because I'm passionate about it. And I'm honestly very lucky to be in a position where I can afford to spend the amount of time (and out-of-pocket expenses) that I do engaging in an activity that I, for the vast majority of the process, genuinely enjoy. Still, there's a lot of pressure in today's content-driven economy to keep producing at a steady rate, at the risk of losing followers (and therefore income) if you slack off. But you've already heard me complain about that before.