Acting - nudity

[Khalid]

Non-sexual nudity? That’s how it started in NYPD Blue. Especially that one scene where a young actress was completely nude except for her arms covering her breasts. Now why we needed to see a nude woman folding laundry as a crucial story element is beyond me. No, it always starts under cover of “art” and then it always - 100% of the time - is exploited in porn in various ways which I’d rather not identify.

It always occurs in incremental steps. Take any large used bookstore. Next to the stack of other porn magazines are copies of “art instruction” magazines from the 1950s. Maybe a few even used them for that purpose, but it was just a cover. Just like Playboy was labeled tasteful because it used some of the finest artists or conducted interviews with important people like Fidel Castro. So, you and your boys are buying the latest - at the time - issue to catch the interview with Fidel? To borrow from a TV judge: “Don’t pour water on my leg and tell me it’s raining.” Like the “Gentlemen’s Clubs” that still exist today. What’s inside? Nothing more than your typical gangster fare, circa 1950s burlesque, “Yeah. We only got tha classiest broads here.”

So don’t fall for the “I can find an exception to that,” which DOES NOTHING to explain the other 99.8% of the other so-called art out there.

Peace,
Ed

Not at all - the example I used is clearly sexual in nature. (Thora Birch’s nude scene in American Beauty.)

Just because nudity is non-sexual does not mean it is inoffensive or artistic (i.e. the expression of meaning through symbolism and emotion), and just because it is sexual, does not mean that it is offensive or inartistic.

 

[Khalid]

And even that is not accurate, q.v. Daenerys in Season 1 of Game of Thrones.

Okay. So nudity is permissible. So what were you wondering in your first post? Why a director who has employed nudity permissibly chose to do so?

Now, some of Daenarys’s (let alone the actress, I forget her name) nude scenes were there for the sake of a nude scene, and begin to draw nigh to the definition of gratuitous, e.g. her meeting with Dario Naharis. This can be said about much of the nudity on that show, although, taken not individually, but as a whole, may be said to paint a picture of debauchery and the purest squalor. Although I’m not sure that’s the writer’s reason for it, given the standards on other HBO shows, which are often as unrefined morally as they are refined aesthetically.

 

[Baelor]

Now, some of Daenarys’s (let alone the actress, I forget her name) nude scenes were there for the sake of a nude scene, and begin to draw nigh to the definition of gratuitous, e.g. her meeting with Dario Naharis.

In Season 1, I would disagree. There may have been one or two, but the use of her nudity in the first episode versus the last was masterful.

 

[Khalid]

I believe her meeting with Dario Naharis is about halfway in to series 3. I’ve not seen all of the episodes in order to remember, although I’ve read the books (which are toned down for television).

 

[Baelor]

I believe her meeting with Dario Naharis is about halfway in to series 3. I’ve not seen all of the episodes in order to remember, although I’ve read the books (which are toned down for television).

That is correct. I was simply saying that I was referring to Season 1.

 

[edwest2]

Not at all - the example I used is clearly sexual in nature. (Thora Birch’s nude scene in American Beauty.)

Just because nudity is non-sexual does not mean it is inoffensive or artistic (i.e. the expression of meaning through symbolism and emotion), and just because it is sexual, does not mean that it is offensive or inartistic.

Justify it any way you want. This is a Catholic message board and you will be getting the Catholic answer. As an assistant art director, I have to understand all of the elements of what makes something “artistic” or not. Artists are not above other human beings. They are people upon whom, partly for marketing purposes, are product and their output is product. There are plenty of actor wannabes waiting tables in LA hoping for that call from their agent. And the same can be said for screenwriters.

From the Catechism: “2521 Purity requires modesty, an integral part of temperance. Modesty protects the intimate center of the person. It means refusing to unveil what should remain hidden. It is ordered to chastity to whose sensitivity it bears witness. It guides how one looks at others and behaves toward them in conformity with the dignity of persons and their solidarity.”

Art does not create a magic bubble that makes the unacceptable, to Catholics at least, acceptable.

Peace,
Ed

 

[Baelor]

Justify it any way you want. This is a Catholic message board and you will be getting the Catholic answer.

The only Catholic answer is that nudity is not intrinsically sinful in art.

From the Catechism: “2521 Purity requires modesty, an integral part of temperance. Modesty protects the intimate center of the person. It means refusing to unveil what should remain hidden. It is ordered to chastity to whose sensitivity it bears witness. It guides how one looks at others and behaves toward them in conformity with the dignity of persons and their solidarity.”

Art does not create a magic bubble that makes the unacceptable, to Catholics at least, acceptable.

Then you will have to explain why the Papal Conclave meets in a room where there is rampant nudity in the art.

 

[Khalid]

Maybe he draws a distinction between the representation of nude persons by means other than nude persons (e.g. sculpting, painting) and the representation of nude persons by nude persons (i.e. film, meatspace).

There most certainly can be pornographic nudity in sculpture and painting - look at the ancient Greek vases and amphorae with scenes of pederasty painted on - which is nonetheless considered “art” (although, as indicated by my use of scare quotes, the artfulness of this eludes even me), and non-pornographic nudity on film (i.e. sexting) which is not considered art.

There is some sort of at least semi-consistent definition used for “art” - it is not nearly as arbitrary as Ed claims, but seems, as I have endeavoured to do so, to be very difficult to define.

 

[Baelor]

Maybe he draws a distinction between the representation of nude persons by means other than nude persons (e.g. sculpting, painting) and the representation of nude persons by nude persons (i.e. film, meatspace).

There most certainly can be pornographic nudity in sculpture and painting - look at the ancient Greek vases and amphorae with scenes of pederasty painted on - which is nonetheless considered “art” (although, as indicated by my use of scare quotes, the artfulness of this eludes even me), and non-pornographic nudity on film (i.e. sexting) which is not considered art.

There is some sort of at least semi-consistent definition used for “art” - it is not nearly as arbitrary as Ed claims, but seems, as I have endeavoured to do so, to be very difficult to define.

On what basis would such a distinction be made?

 

[epiclotus]

On what basis would such a distinction be made?

One is made of paint or stone, and one is made of flesh?

 

[Kamaduck]

One is made of paint or stone, and one is made of flesh?

That does strike me as an important difference, though I’m not going to say that nudity depicted using actual nudity is always immoral. (And if you want to get really technical, the portrayals of nudity that we’re talking about aren’t so much made of flesh, as they are pictures of flesh that have been captured on film or converted to code, and then converted back to light for us on a TV or computer screen…)

Anyway, the artists probably had nude models. Somebody had to look at nude people at some point for reference.

 

[Baelor]

One is made of paint or stone, and one is made of flesh?

I am familiar with the difference between a sculpture and a human. I am simply offering deserved resistance to any claim of self-evidence, i.e. that nudity in art is obviously only permissible in media not involving live humans, a claim that requires as a premise that these two forms should be considered separate in this respect.

 

[edwest2]

Maybe he draws a distinction between the representation of nude persons by means other than nude persons (e.g. sculpting, painting) and the representation of nude persons by nude persons (i.e. film, meatspace).

There most certainly can be pornographic nudity in sculpture and painting - look at the ancient Greek vases and amphorae with scenes of pederasty painted on - which is nonetheless considered “art” (although, as indicated by my use of scare quotes, the artfulness of this eludes even me), and non-pornographic nudity on film (i.e. sexting) which is not considered art.

There is some sort of at least semi-consistent definition used for “art” - it is not nearly as arbitrary as Ed claims, but seems, as I have endeavoured to do so, to be very difficult to define.

“very difficult to define”? What do you mean? Everybody who is out looking at photos or movies of nude people has one primary motivation. Calling it art suddenly transforms it into something else? That’s not logical. It’s very black and white.

Peace,
Ed

 

[Kamaduck]

“very difficult to define”? What do you mean? Everybody who is out looking at photos or movies of nude people has one primary motivation. Calling it art suddenly transforms it into something else? That’s not logical. It’s very black and white.

“Everybody”?

I find this hard to believe.

 

[edwest2]

“Everybody”?

I find this hard to believe.

Look at the thread title: “Acting - nudity.” That’s my specific reference.

Peace,
Ed

 

[Baelor]

Look at the thread title: “Acting - nudity.” That’s my specific reference.

Your specific reference is still wrong. It may be more convenient for you to assume that you know exactly why every single person out of billions on this planet does what he does, but I assure you that you do not.

 

[Khalid]

On what basis would such a distinction be made?

Exactly as defined. That one is represented by a real, living, concrete instance of humanity with a soul - a person - and the other is represented by a fictitious, non-existent, non-human simulacrum. The distinction could then be defended along several different grounds - the creation of God v. the lack of a soul (as stone and paint are not required to be modest), ideal form v. instance, etc.

I’m not sure if this distinction is drawn by Ed, and even less sure if it is shared by me, but if he does draw such a distinction, it makes much of his writing and opinions seem more reasonable (if poorly explained, as I’m having to read so much between the lines), using a sort of analogy to the “hermeneutic of orthodoxy” to give the writings the best interpretation possible.

 

[Khalid]

“very difficult to define”? What do you mean? Everybody who is out looking at photos or movies of nude people has one primary motivation. Calling it art suddenly transforms it into something else? That’s not logical. It’s very black and white.

Peace,
Ed

This is incorrect. When I saw the film American Beauty, I did not know it had nudity in it beforehand (it has two nude scenes that I recall, but the one I have mention draws nearer to art). I do not screen what I read or view as some coarse individuals do, to make sure that it contains nudity, violence, or smut: but neither do I screen what I read or view as some other individuals do, to make sure that it contains no nudity, or violence, or smut.

Even in some cases where the violence and smut is overdone, the work that it is included in can still be a work of art, and meaningful, such as American Beauty, A Song of Ice and Fire (the books), most of Thomas Pynchon’s writings, Infinite Jest, The Departed, etc.

I do not deny there is also equally-inspired art that is not violent or smutty. The lack of, or saturation with, these elements does not make or break the meaning of a work of art: the appropriate level is dependent on the context, in what is being portrayed (say, war, or Hell, as in the Inferno of Dante), or in the emotional response and power that is meant to be evoked (say, in Michaelangelo’s David, or his The Creation of Adam).

Art is not limited to one medium, just as meaning is not limited to one medium. Art is a way of expressing meaning in a way that affects the emotions and moves the soul in ways that rational argumentation do not. Just as with any other method of communication, meaning can be expressed in multiple ways, in various mediums, with a nearly-unlimited subject matter, represented (or not represented, etc.) in marble or other stone, in mosaic, in print, in film, or on canvas.

Here is a recent article I read that has some bearing on this subject:
James Chastek:

The opening lines of Larkin’s Annus Mirabilis is quoted to death, but here is the whole thing:

Sexual intercourse began
In nineteen sixty-three
(which was rather late for me) -
Between the end of the Chatterley ban
And the Beatles’ first LP.

Up to then there’d only been
A sort of bargaining,
A wrangle for the ring,
A shame that started at sixteen
And spread to everything.

Then all at once the quarrel sank:
Everyone felt the same,
And every life became
A brilliant breaking of the bank,
A quite unlosable game.

So life was never better than
In nineteen sixty-three
(Though just too late for me) -
Between the end of the Chatterley ban
And the Beatles’ first LP.

As a critic of the sexual revolution that Larkin here praises, I have all sorts of intellectual and philosophical responses to the poem: it overlooks the benefits of social stability that were ensured by the culture that was rejected “in nineteen sixty three”; it is marred by overlooking the benefits of sexual sublimation (viz. culture, high art); it is blind to the vulgarizing effects of free sex, which lead to a coarsening of art, language, and discourse; it has nothing to say of the catastrophic consequences of disease, home-wrecking, and the inevitable cruelty that follows from sexual licence; it fails to see that sex-on-demand destroys romance and that it very quickly becomes boring, since the ecstatic power of sex is lost when it is not dammed up.

But what is all of this? Just another Catholic blogger giving first-draft philosophical arguments. It does nothing to touch that part of the soul that Larkin’s very refined lyric penetrates to. I can only watch poem do its work and do nothing to stop its course. The only refutation of the poem would be one of comparable lyric force that describes the sexual revolution as it actual is: a short-sighted hedonism that devastates society by degrading the underclass to a savage and swinish existence and alienates the elites into self-absorbed tyranny.

But this would require a poet of extraordinary lyric skill and philosophical insight, and such a person requires an entire civilization ordered to making him. If we had a poet with Larkin’s skill, what would he learn at, say, Harvard? If society took notice of his writing talents, what sort of writing career would exert the strongest and most constant pull on his ability? He might end up script writing for Desperate Housewives or making copy for advertising firms, but it would never cross his mind to refute Annus Mirabilis.

All of this is a variant on Socrates’s lament in Book VI of the Republic: we need a well-trained elite mind to counteract the perversions we find in our midst, but one would never expect an elite mind to resist the attractive power of advancing them. This attraction is intense and life-long, working both through manifest incentives and subconsciously understood structures. It’s not for nothing that the system of the Anti-Christ is called the world.

And yet for all that, we still have one hope: Larkin’s poem is bad art, since art by its nature shows things as they are. The love of art itself is a force that threatens to blast Annus Mirabilis to pieces, and such a force can’t be restrained forever.

The bolded line is as good a definition as any.

 

[Baelor]

Exactly as defined. That one is represented by a real, living, concrete instance of humanity with a soul - a person - and the other is represented by a fictitious, non-existent, non-human simulacrum. The distinction could then be defended along several different grounds - the creation of God v. the lack of a soul (as stone and paint are not required to be modest), ideal form v. instance, etc.

I’m not sure if this distinction is drawn by Ed, and even less sure if it is shared by me, but if he does draw such a distinction, it makes much of his writing and opinions seem more reasonable (if poorly explained, as I’m having to read so much between the lines), using a sort of analogy to the “hermeneutic of orthodoxy” to give the writings the best interpretation possible.

I was not talking about the distinction between sculpture and humans. I was talking about that distinction in the context of nudity. When we consider that modesty involves covering what should be covered, it is not at all obvious to me that we should apply different standards to painting or to sculpture than to human beings.

 

[edwest2]

Exactly as defined. That one is represented by a real, living, concrete instance of humanity with a soul - a person - and the other is represented by a fictitious, non-existent, non-human simulacrum. The distinction could then be defended along several different grounds - the creation of God v. the lack of a soul (as stone and paint are not required to be modest), ideal form v. instance, etc.

I’m not sure if this distinction is drawn by Ed, and even less sure if it is shared by me, but if he does draw such a distinction, it makes much of his writing and opinions seem more reasonable (if poorly explained, as I’m having to read so much between the lines), using a sort of analogy to the “hermeneutic of orthodoxy” to give the writings the best interpretation possible.

1. A painting, sculpture or mural that includes nude or partly nude figures needs to present those figures in a manner that respects their dignity, whether they are being confronted by evil or in other situations. It is not difficult to separate certain types of presentations. There are those that are respectful, but there are those that are lewd, purient and suggestive of immoral intent according to the way the figure is posed, facial expression and related elements. One example is a painting of a reclining nude on a wall in an Old West saloon where the size and shape of her body parts are the only content. The dignity of the person is buried and only her sexuality is emphasized in a shameless way. It was not unusual to see pulp magazine cover paintings where the material covering the female figure barely did the job.
2. In acting, in the early years, meaning the 70s and 80s, it was the case that some actresses would refuse to pose partly or fully nude, so a ‘body double’ was used and her face was not seen (from the back) or hidden in shadow if shot from a more frontal angle. A few actresses decided not to care even though they were being exploited for their body parts. As the decades passed, the trend for more nudity of a lewd, purient and immoral nature began to slowly increase.

Today, we already have an example of what would have qualified as ‘soft porn’ from the 70s.

Progress? No, definitely not. Freedom? For what? To have a bunch of guys leering at a woman’s body, hoping to get as many looks as possible?

A hard, black and white line, needs to be drawn. There is such a thing as going too far. Too many have fallen for the lie that casual sex, nudity and general immoral behavior qualifies as “entertainment.” Art? No.

Peace,
Ed