Boudoir photography has many faces and depending on the photographer, it can have a different mood, energy and style. The client always drives the dynamic of the session by defining their own level of comfort and ease. In other words, the client decides how comfortable they feel in front of the camera and what kind of images they are looking for.
Over the course of my professional work, I have encountered women who wished to reveal only a glimpse of their body as well as those who were comfortable with nude posing. Today, I would like to focus on the latter one and explore the beauty of sophisticated nude photography.
Despite it being classified as fine art, nude photography is a controversial matter. Some believe there is something shameful about posing au naturel, others believe it is distasteful and unacceptable. As a photographer and artist, I respectfully disagree with both of these statements. Having worked with this genre for quite some time, I have learned to appreciate the beauty and simplicity of human body in its most elementary and natural form.
For centuries, artists have been fascinated with the human body. Back in ancient Greece and Rome, sculptures and paintings of nude individuals decorated public arenas and many of them have survived to this day. As time went by, the issue of using nude subjects in art has become more and more debatable. There is a very fine line between fine art and something more explicit and every photographer must define where that line is.
Nude art photography can be very subtle. A skillful use of light and shadow can create a very intimate ambiance. It can elicit a mysterious and seductive mood without overly explicit imagery. But seduction is rarely ever the goal of nude art photography.
Clothes create barriers and distract; they define us in often very misleading ways. Clothes let us hide behind a façade. A nude human body is the essence of beauty and vulnerability. Something very profound happens when we are striped out of our outer layers. This is where vulnerability begins. It is this vulnerability more than anything else that makes nude art so unique and powerful.
