"Nude" or "Naked"?

[Karin Wells]

Starting from: http://forum.portraitartist.com/show...0&pagenumber=3

This has become a hot topic on a different thread and is worth reposting by itself. It also factors into our discussions of "vulgar" or "tasteless".

I do think that there is a BIG difference between "nude" and "naked" in art.

[Peggy Baumgaertner]

My grandfather often told this story of a nude model in his art school. She liked to look at the students work while on her break. The only problem - she was totally nude while doing so! My grandfather did not know what to do about it, as you might well imagine, until the next class. Before she removed her robe, he took her aside and said, "When you are posing, you are a nude. But when you are on your break, you are just a naked lady! Please wear your robe."

Maybe someone should post this as a new topic? We have strayed so far from this one...

I'll bite...(No pun intended)

I've a plethora of unclothed model stories. I dare say that there is probably no other profession where normal, objective, nonprurient professionals go about their jobs whilst surrounded by naked people, (excepting doctors, of course, and they take an oath to not tell amusing stories...)

When I was in art school, we also had a nude model who would not only walk around and view the artwork in progress, she would brazenly flirt with the boys. She, however, would wear a little crop top shirt on top, and nothing on the bottom. If there is anything more naked than a nude model off the model stand, it is a model prancing around naked from the waist down....

Peggy

[Rochelle Brown]

It's interesting to hear Sister Wendy on the subject. As for me, I am affected by nudes in art or real life, especially muscular young men. A nude with a historical significance or theme is usually considered less vulgar, and often very much respected. Although many consider the human body in itself a work of art even without an excuse to be naked. Rembrandt's nudes were often the subject of controversy in his day. In any case there are people I would not want to go walking through the Met with...

[Mike McCarty]

I'm sure you have all heard the saying ... if a woman sees a man undressing in front of an open window the man is an exhibitionist, if a man sees a woman undressing in front of an open window the man is a peeping Tom.

[Cynthia Daniel]

Guys just can't win, can they Mike?

[Mike McCarty]

I gotta stick up fer my geeender.

[Rochelle Brown]

I could say something ... but won't

[Morris Darby]

I've left several classes where the instructor didn't handle things professionally. I consider myself a professional and there is a high concentration of effort in a professional setting and the model wandering around the room between sittings would be more of an obstruction to an end than a distraction.

The nude, whether male or female, is a most interesting subject to draw or paint. There are so many subtle curves, planes, shadows, etc. I particularly love to look at other artists' studies of the same to see how they handle the same things I may find challenging. However, I don't see many nude paintings selling like they did in the 70's and 80's. I don't know why. I also rarely see any contemporary nude paintings that appeal to me as an artist. Although, there was an American artist (female) living in Italy that has some spectacular drawings of the male anatomy. I saw an article recently (can't remember her name) and her work reminded me of some old master's works.

Well, I keep studying nudes in classes and I keep learning more about light and it's infinite ways of marrying with a subject. And I seem to produce more satisfying paintings of light and subject. I think it is still the best learning tool.

[Mike McCarty]

One of the most appealing nudes I've seen lately is the one found in John H. Sanden's book on page 47 (the book is shown in the left margin of this thread). Also don't miss Juan Martinez's nudes on his web site: http://www.juanmartinez.com/pages/Gl...e_Academy.html

[Juan Martinez]

Peggy et al.;

This subject is indeed oddly fascinating. I have an interesting, if dry, academic article entitled: "Nudity as a Costume in Classical Art", by Larissa Bonfante in American Journal of Achaelology 93 (1989) pp. 543 - 570. It is worth a read if you can get your hands on it. In a nutshell, the article shows how it was the Greeks whom we have to thank for our preoccupation with the nude in representational art. They first used nudes (males at the beginning, and later, females) to distinguish their culture from that of "barbarism". Nudity was used both ritualistically and artistically as costume. Everything from warding off evil to demonstrating cultural superiority were the offshoots of this. Plus, considering the unicity of all life as evidenced by, for example, the Golden Mean, the human body is representative of Nature in all its guises. Thus, human form, even today, is one of our ultimate teachers.

On a more amusing note, we had a male model at Angel Studios who went one further than the female models that Peggy referred to. While posing he would, often as not, sport a rather significant erection. (I won't go into how indadequate it made most of the males in the class feel.) But, he was so unabashed about it that everyone eventually got used to it. He, too, had the habit of checking out everyone's work between sittings and he would walk around (now naked, rather than nude) to look at the drawings. We finally asked him to put something on during these times after one student complained that it made her a little uncomfortable when she was sitting down at her bench (a drawing horse, I think they're called) and he would come over to look at what she was working on. His height, coupled with the position she was sitting in, put his unmentionables pretty much right in front of her face. Now, she wasn't at all a prudish type, but still, it made for a not-too-professional atmosphere at that moment. It really did come down to that strange, but true, reality that the model is nude on the stand and naked elsewhere.

Happy painting. And, oh yes, thank you Mike for the kind reference to my nakeds -- I mean, nudes.

Juan