This past Saturday, I took a canoe trip along Lake Upsilon in the wilds of northern North Dakota. The sun had just come up over the tiered peaks of the pine, and the greenish-black water glittered under a thinning mist. I had just come around the lake’s western fork, bringing into view some cabins lining the shore. That was when I saw the naked woman.
In truth, she wasn't completely naked. Not yet. She wore a scant bikini, and she was peeling it off in protracted fashion, as if for the benefit of a camera. She posed and pressed and canted against the railing of the cabin’s deck.
I pulled my oar out of the water, and as I drifted ahead, a man came into view in front of her. Perhaps he was a boyfriend or a husband. At the very least, he was an amateur photographer. He was snapping pictures briskly with a camera that looked elaborate. I didn't get the make; in an effort not to stare, I was allowing myself only repeated, rapid-fire glances at the model.
The woman took off the bikini bra, and then she took off the bikini panties. The woman moved through numerous postures, some demure and some vaguely decadent. I could tell she was somewhat comely even without my male gaze at full-bore. Her skin was honey-brown, like a full-bodied lager.
As I coasted past, casting my glances, my first reaction was aghast. I'm not a prude, nor am I offended by nudes, arty or otherwise. But my initial mental spasm to the (somewhat) public nudity was to be taken aback. The impudence! The profligacy! And to be taking photos of the whole affair—the narcissism! The sexism! Shame on him! Where was his feminism? And as for her feminism, what cognitive gymnastics had she done to rationalize this?
Perhaps these priggish knee-jerks occurred because nudity outside the house is such an unfamiliar thing, especially in North Dakota. But my righteousness had fast subsided once I'd glided a quarter-mile down the lake. By then I'd started interrogating my assumptions about these intimate nudes in a new light.
Perhaps this photo session represented new levels of intimacy for this couple. In whatever time they’d spent together, they had evoked a mutual liberation in one another. His photographing her wasn't necessarily exploitative. Rather, it could be an exploration in the expanding landscape of their love. And it didn't even have to be romantic. These nudes could be a new and exciting milestone in a budding artistic collaboration. Conceivably, these photos were the very zenith of a Platonic partnership that spanned creativity and companionship.
Who was I to declare this photo session tawdry? It wasn't necessarily smut they were fashioning. Perhaps it was all private and personal, for the satisfaction, aesthetic and/or sexual, of one or both parties. Perhaps it was even art. Together, photographer and nude were producing something beautiful—a portfolio, perhaps, or even a deliciously risqué installation for the Bismarck art district. Perhaps this photo session would go onto a DeviantArt account, to be seen by anyone anywhere in the world. Even if the partnership, Platonic or otherwise, didn't work out, model and photographer would at least be left with something lovely they'd collaborated to create, surrounded by the verdant forest and the dawn. Her nude body, elegantly posed, would coruscate in harmony with the water, thanks to his eye and her willingness. This photo set could capture the splendor of the lake scenery and the people of the region. It could travel all over the globe. This would champion artistic voices from exotic locales, as places like North Dakota are strange tropics from the perspective of the cosmopolitan world of art.
And even if it was porn, this didn't have to be a problem. It could be refreshing. As I floated down the lake, I reflected on all the years and all the nude photos I’d viewed, from artsy to outright tawdry. Whether art or porn, the scene was almost always situated in New York or LA (not necessarily respectively, and rarely respectfully). If not there, then it was set in Europe or somewhere tropical like Hawaii or Miami or Rio. It was always on a beach or in a fancy home—a mansion or at least an upper middle-class abode. Quality nude photos have always had one not-so-subtle subtext: you have to be upwardly mobile or outright elite to be involved in any worthwhile depiction of nakedness.
Then and there, on that deck behind me, a photographer and his subject were taking back the nude photo. Together, they were reclaiming the aesthetic dignity of points north. Together, they were creating nudes that were visual essays arguing a counterpoint to nude photos taken theretofore: that the untainted, natural beauty of a remote northern state could be a viable backdrop for a human beauty in the nude. The setting didn't have to be a palm-girded manse with a pool overlooking LA or an ocean. It could be a densely-forested lake with water the color of Jägermeister. The model could be a squat, thick-thighed girl.
We need more nudes at northern lakes. We need stripteases in foothills and in badlands. We need erotic thrillers on the pie-bald prairies. We need sex scenes, simulated and non-simulated, in snow. We need girl-on-girl action in unassuming log cabins. We need orgies on weather-beaten decks.
The list is endless. Every permutation and combination of the above should be made to happen if we want art—or at least arty porn—to thrive.
And so, in a matter of minutes, I had gone from abhorring these nude photos to adoring them. I had gone from crying foul to crying for more. I slid my paddle in the water and steered back around. The cabin and the deck approached anew. The photographer was still photographing, the clack of his shutter having worked up to a chittering paroxysm of artistry.
And the girl, she'd struck a pose on all fours and in full
mammalian lordosis, prying apart her ass-halves for the camera's
Cyclopean eye.