“If i can’t dance, i don’t want to be a part of your revolution.” -emma goldman
I wanna dance naked with myself. I wanna take strides and leaps and feel the pieces of flesh that cannot define me but are always there to consume me. I wanna feel the joy of brushing up against myself and knowing that its someone i love. I wanna feel at ease with my body and feel pleasure from its every movement.
I wanna dance naked, hand-in-hand, with those that are told we shouldn’t cuz are bodies remind those around us of their fragility. I wanna show the world the beauty in dancing naked when its demanded that we stay clothed. I wanna remind the world that its not about, but not without, our bodies.
So when i close my eyes and stroke my thigh you know that i’m dancing naked for myself. And when i’m ready, and you’re ready, i’ll reach for your hand and we’ll dance together - laughing at nothing in particular.
—–
When i first saw this picture taken by Leonard Nimoy, this is what i wrote. I was elated to see such a sight of beauty - joy dancing naked. But my elation was soon grounded as i looked at the title of the photo set, “Full Body Project”. I was quick to look and see what the other sets were like. Sure enough, the others consisted of shots of thin nude wimmin mostly in contorted or statue-esque poses. The other sets had names like “The Dance Nudes”, “The Borghese Series”, and “The Shekhina Project”. These sets were about beauty, individuals, settings, and movement, not about the bodies.
In the dominant culture, conventionally beautiful, temporarily able-bodied, White assigned-wimmin are denied their bodies. Partly because their bodies are normalized and partly because their bodies are no longer bodies, but objects. However, the rest of us are never allowed to forget our bodies. Not only are we taught to hate our bodies, but we are constantly reminded of how much others hate our bodies. Even when someone seemingly tries to highlight the beauty of a group of people dancing naked regardless of their size, it becomes another exercise in reminding us how much our bodies are despised when we label the photo series “Full Body Project”. Once again, it ceases to be about pure beauty, because those outside the standards of conventional beauty can never reach pure beauty. Instead, we are a tainted beauty - a beauty of pity. The body is not a means for persynal love and beauty, it is a measuring stick. Are you a (real) beauty or a full body beauty?
Real beauty is not reminded of its body because the body no longer exists - it is simply beauty. For fat people, the body always exists. For differently-ablied people, the body always exists. For people of color, the body always exists. For trans people, the body always exists. But we are not allowed to exist in harmony with our bodies. To love our bodies as beauty. For to love our bodies as beauty means to accept a body as beautiful.
[tags]Big Fat Carnival[/tags]
Share This
vegan, IM in between classes right now, so i can’t comment extensivelly at the moment, but i *had* to take a moment to thank you for that picture–it is the most beautiful picture i’ve seen in a while–the only thing is, i wish they couldve been outside–so often when youre fat you use anything you can to hide yourself from the world–your clothes, your hair, your house, your car–very rarely do you feel like you can just walk around outside where anybody in the world might come upon you and snicker or berate you…so i think the only thing that would have made this picture *perfect* is if they could’ve been outside–fat people don’t get to feel the warm glow of the sun on their bodies (and on the gender issue, women don’t get to feel sun on their breasts) and there is just something that is deeply cleansing and beautiful about feeling the warmth of the sun penetrate into your body after you’ve been inside and cold all winter. i spent a week at a freinds house who lived out in the middle of no where, and it was liberating for me to be able to be outside with no clothes on…and there is *absolutly* nothing sexier to me than watching men play sports with very very few clothes on (preferably non at all)–just being in the passion of the moment, not worried about any thing, having that aggressiveness channelled into something positive–mmmm.
anyway, thanks again for the picture!! (ps did you see this: http://www.laurietobyedison.com/galleryWEL.asp?page=1 and this: http://www.laurietobyedison.com/galleryFM.asp?page=1
your picture reminds me a lot of these pictures–just the beauty of bodies…
ok, off to class off to class!!
Yes–I want to dance naked too! Imagine the liberation in that–a dance enjoying free of self-conscioussness or that ugly never good enough feeling.
Being comfortable in ones skin is also a struggling road for so many.
And that was a beautiful image over at Brownfemipower’s blog, way to go with your talented self!
On that note that was a great description that you gave of the Cancun WTO event that occurred in 2003 with mostly Mexican women protesting along other people of color and allies, thanks for sharing your experiences and thoughts, truly.
brownfemipower - you are so right! Even the liberation of dance is hidden behind walls (though made public by the lens of the camera). A very liberating moment for me came a couple of years ago when i went swimming naked in a lake with four other friends. It was the first time i had been naked in front of people other than a lover for the first time since i was a child. I avoided it like the plague because of how i was taught to view my body (and because of my fears of people gender-typing me based on my body). But you know what? I stripped down, stood together with my friends and we did cannonballs off a drain pump. We had fun. We didn’t judge, we just laughed and swam. That moment has helped me feel a lot more at ease with my body. Funny how such little, seemingly insignificant moments can be so life-altering.
fab -thanks! I’m so glad you came over to my humble abode.
My pleasure, your humble abode my booty!;-)
You have an awesome blog here, and I’ve been lurking and reading for a bit you know–just working the nerve to comment can take a bit.
Oh and I’ve also gone swimming naked, I was 15 though–and it was with my cousins. They were 13, that was so much fun. It was at a house pool also. I clearly remember how beautiful it felt to dive and swim underwater with no clothes on. Oh and it was night time–good memories.
Thank you for posting that picture- it’s positively beautiful. No matter the context in which it was created, it is what it is, and we can all enjoy art through the filters of what we bring to it.
Don’t be so distressed over it. Leonard Nimoy is truly supportive of size acceptance. If we can use fat as a positive word, then he can use a “Full Body” as a decriptor and not have any negativity associated with it. If you check his other galleries, you will see that he includes fat women in his classic nudes series as well.
But here’s what Nimoy said about the troupe:
“The women are interested in fat liberation. Their self-esteem is strong. They will tell you that too many people suffer because the body they live in is not the body you find in the fashion magazines.”
Plus, he was disgusted with the way Kirstie Alley treated fat people:
Leonard Nimoy on the depiction of overweight women in Kirstie Alley’s ‘Fat Actress.’
“It’s deplorable, dishonest, contrived. My models are proud people.”
http://www.bigfatblog.com/archives/001518.php
So don’t throw it all out simply because of the title of the project, please.
Timewalker - i’m not throwing out the picture, or the project, because of the title. Nor am i trying to disregard Nimoy’s sincerity. I’m just asking why it is that “non-conventional” beauty is usually brought up in the context of contrasting it with “conventional” beauty. Its hard to create a praxis of liberation if that liberation is framed within an oppressive context/discourse, ya know? Thanks for the link, BTW. I’ve only recently become familiar with Nimoy’s photography work.
Thanks so much for shining your light on what seems so innocuous–a title describing a photo series.
Absolutely stunning! I am fat and I am beautiful and sexy and not the least bit ashamed of it. The photograph reminds me of the old masters’ paintings featuring gorgeous round and curvy women who actually looked like women. Cheers!
vegankid,
i gotta run now, but i just discovered this, older post of yours and was absolutely amazed at its disarming honesty… it got me to thinkng a lot. about “beauty”, or rather socially accepted and promoted constructs of it… and how insecure i feel about many different aspects of my physical self, and how self-conscious. mostly feeling negative, honestly, than just being happy and satisfied with what i was given by nature. always trying to lose something, to shape something differently, to always lose another 2-3 vanity pounds…
i realized that never do i really stop and enjoy my body, my beauty, my freedome to move and to feel safe and complete in my own skin, however “imperfect” my body may seem to me in contrast with the standards of beauty that stare at me from magazines…
i wanna dance naked too. i wanna always be naked. i wanna take off this devastating internalized self-critical, self-hating mindset. i wanna learn not to care. to feel sexy and irresistable at all times. to feel comfortable being myself and not to take what others may say/think/judge.
how do i do that? is it possible? have YOU figured out how?
truly and honestly?!!!!!!!!!!!????????
wow, sky, you’ve been doing some digging, huh? well, i’m glad. first off, from what i’ve seen, you are absolutely beautiful. i know that there’s a difference between other people recognizing it and recognizing it ourselves, but sometimes it helps to hear it. and i honestly mean it.
i wish i knew how to do it. but as the post says, i want to dance naked. but i haven’t found the ability yet. slowly, i think its happening. much more so than in the past. from time to time i’ll shed the heavy garment of socialization and internalized hatred to catch a brief moment of naked movement. in all honesty, i think this is a conversastion that needs to happen more often. too frequently we are caught up in attacking such things as media representations. but while we are attacking all these outside forces, we continue to ignore ourselves and our own bodies. thus feeding into the original problem and not creating what it is that we want and need to create.
Fantastic post.
Every angle has its defining points, but this is exquisite in more than just the common literature therein. Words without sound but many pictures does the mind create ,and if not anything else it gives hope to the black shadow of insecurity.
Hello,
I do dance naked out in the middle of nowhere. When I dance I become aware of Gaia, that single life-force on which we are dependant and are destroying with Global warming. It is for that reason that I recommend that everybody should Dance Naked outdoors. I left my e-mail address in the field provided above and should anyone in Cape Town, South Africa, want to know more then I shall make myself available to chat to them. If you are further afield then we can get an e-mail conversation going. Just ask…..