I am feeling quite poorly. Nothing major, just a cold, a cough, a very sore throat. It feels worse when you get this in summer. Of course these things always happen when you are at your busiest. I was down to do a dawn shoot, now I have to cancel it. I have enrolled for a summer school in choreography which starts tomorrow. I hope I will be better by tomorrow afternoon as I don't want to miss the first day. On top of this there's the rehearsals for the play, the last thing I want is to have this horrible flu coming along with me. It wont make me popular with the other actors, that's for sure.
I got this because on Friday I went to Hyde Park to see Iggy and the Stooges and Soundgarden and got totally drenched. As Chris Cornell intoned Black Hole Sun the heavens opened and no, he did not manage to wash away the rain.
Rant over. I was actually very pleased earlier to receive an email from a photographer friend. He has been asking interesting questions, important ones, on the nature of nude modelling. From time to time models and photographers don't see eye to eye about the images they make together. Some are really revealing and I don't mean this in the sense that 'certain' body parts are on show. I mean that they really are incisive portraits and often they show the model in a moment of extreme vulnerability. It is what makes a photograph really meaningful and yet it can be extremely difficult for the model to be seen that way. There have been a few photos taken of me that made me feel uncomfortable. Most of the time the photographers involved were very courteous, understood my reasons and removed the photos from their online portfolios. One or two did not and took great offense at my remarks/requests. C'est la vie.
Is nude photography a risk for the model? asks my friend.
I dont have a solution, nor an answer to the questions, says my photographer friend. Nor do I.
But I have learnt one thing. Take a little distance. It can work miracles.
I got this because on Friday I went to Hyde Park to see Iggy and the Stooges and Soundgarden and got totally drenched. As Chris Cornell intoned Black Hole Sun the heavens opened and no, he did not manage to wash away the rain.
Rant over. I was actually very pleased earlier to receive an email from a photographer friend. He has been asking interesting questions, important ones, on the nature of nude modelling. From time to time models and photographers don't see eye to eye about the images they make together. Some are really revealing and I don't mean this in the sense that 'certain' body parts are on show. I mean that they really are incisive portraits and often they show the model in a moment of extreme vulnerability. It is what makes a photograph really meaningful and yet it can be extremely difficult for the model to be seen that way. There have been a few photos taken of me that made me feel uncomfortable. Most of the time the photographers involved were very courteous, understood my reasons and removed the photos from their online portfolios. One or two did not and took great offense at my remarks/requests. C'est la vie.
Is nude photography a risk for the model? asks my friend.
Yes it is. "The reality of the power of your own image to change and shape and even destroy your life cannot be understood until [something awful] happens to you" says another friend who has had a very hard time as suddenly she was put in the stocks and some people felt entitled to scrutinise and comment on her appearance and actions, even character - and they did not even know her.
I dont have a solution, nor an answer to the questions, says my photographer friend. Nor do I.
But I have learnt one thing. Take a little distance. It can work miracles.
Alex, I hope you feel better soon. Models do indeed risk everything in trusting their image will be respected and their work taken as it was meant. For all the Respect the Models rhetoric on the mega art site, an art community is a human construct and can quickly turn into "Lord of the Flies."
ReplyDeleteSome of us have decided it isn't worth the risk.