| | Nudity in Fine Art Can be Clothed with Many Meanings
When a work of art is referred to as "a nude," the term generally connotes a classical study of the aesthetics of the human body, sans clothes. However, public nudity, "gratuitous" nudity in movies, and nudity in adult magazines are conventionally thought of with less reverence. Compare the following images of people without clothes, and consider how the subject matter varies, even while the physical subject displayed in each image is still just an unclothed person. |
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 | | | |   Look at this comparison.
One of these unclothed people is pictured staring off, as if not to acknowledge the photographer taking the picture or to take notice of us, the viewers of the photograph.
The other naked woman, however, appears to be staring suggestively at us, thus simulating the effect of the viewer being engaged in some kind of communication with her.
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| Nudity has always served art as a very powerful and controversial sort of imagery. The implications of an image of a naked person can vary between the erotic, a subtle sexual tease, an examination of the natural design and function of the human body, a focus on graceful qualities or awkwardness, or a representation of the emotions of the unclothed subject, and so on.
The point is that nudity in imagery can obviously take on contexts other than classical studies of the human form. The proponents of fine art or high art have traditionally disdained imagery that, rather than focusing on a nude as a study of the figure, depicts nakedness as a means to suggest something more, or depicts circumstantial nakedness within a broader context. Implications of sexuality, especially, are often seen by some to downgrade the value of art. |
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| Coop
"But is it Art?"
© Coop 1996 |
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