Photoshop Disasters

Via C'est la Craic, who has far too much time on his hands. I quite like your blog and visit from time to time, he emails. Unfortunately for art, I came across the bath photo and got creative.

Indeed.

Eyes Wide Shut

Visit Annie for another.

Rub A Dub Dub

I looked the email up again and dialled the number. "Primal's Porno Palace" an efficient voice barked in an official tone. "Erm..." I countered, my cheeks burning. Just what the fuck was I getting myself into?

Half an hour later we were in his kitchen, sitting down to polite tea and Viscounts before settling down to business. Annie was bright and breezy, as if she does this kind of thing every day. Primal seemed right at home, but then it was his kitchen.

Me? I was shiteing myself.

I hate having my photograph taken. I am both unphotogenic and vain, and as a result I am a notoriously reluctant subject. But I was flattered by Annie's request, and she's so sympathetic, sweet and reassuring that I figured I could take her easily if I didn't like the results; burn the evidence, hide the body.

When it came down to it, taking my clothes off was easy. Not snotting myself as I clambered into the beautiful cast iron tub whilst trying to maintain some semblance of dignity - not so much. She tells me that I am an excellent poser, I choose to believe she means it as a compliment. It's not that I preen, you see, just that I am really really good at staying still. Two years as a public servant will do that to a girl, but at least now I am reassured that should the Gaeilgeoir jobs market dry up, I have the option of a career as an artist's model. As I look down the barrel of another Monday morning in the office, sitting on my nudie hole and getting paid for it looks quite attractive. Mind you, I have already spent the greater part of this morning doing little more than sitting on my hole and getting paid for it, albeit with a few layers of fabric between my seat and the chair.

She emailed me the final photo yesterday evening. It's beautiful.

When Solitaire's The Only Game In Town

Noody Nady

Originally conceived as Naked Tuesday, the muggy weather these past few weeks has encouraged me to abandon trous as soon as I fall in the door from work each evening. In the hallway. Although I find it quite liberating, I still give myself the occasional fright when I pass a mirror. I have never been comfortable in my skin but for the past few weeks I've been practicing hard, making every effort to subscribe to Jack's Nice Dream.

Rhubarb Roulette
Mother is the necessity of invention - we had a bumper crop of 'barb back on the ranch this summer and I am doing my level best to get through it. This game of chance involves finding out how much stewed rhubarb you can eat before you get the runs, and I can now conclude that it is unfortunately not as much as one would think.

Pillage & Spillage
Where I raid may flatmates cupboards because they have heartlessly abandoned me, and also because I have been too lazy and/or absent to shop. I then cook with such gusto and Gordon Ramsey-fuelled abandon that the kitchen looks like the aftermath of [something apocalyptic] as painted by Jackson Pollock. I do not clean up. I shrug, wipe the soot from my chin and the tears from my eyes and sit down to enjoy a beautifully presented meal at a table set for one; crockery, cutlery, coaster and all.

See? I'm not an animal.

Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny

While a more accommodating bikini might skim and flatter your curves as you prance around in front of the mirror at home (ahem) it will be fuck all use to you as you splash around in the surf on a Basque beach. You'll end up with one hand frantically hoisting up the bra in a vain effort to reposition it over your nipples while the other hand grabs at the side of your knickers, trying to preserve your modesty but succeeding in keeping just one arse cheek covered while the other is not-so-tantalisingly exposed by the drooping, sodden lycra.

No, there are no photos.

Donostia Uncovered

6pm

I enjoy another Campari & Naranja served in what appears to be a goldfish bowl, sitting looking down onto the beach which appears to be entirely populated by young lovers, naked children and elderly nudists. We spend a pleasant few hours feeling like genial perverts.

8pm

Much talk of dinner, particularly the kind of dinner that comes all on the one plate (the others are not so enamoured of the pinxtos). No actual dinner materialises.

10pm

We're on the prowl, but bladder issues see the search for a cool grungy bar abandoned in favour of grotty disco bar. Toilets appear to have been recently frequented by H-blockers.

12am

Cosy corner in a lovely little bar, all knocking back pints of vodka and lemon because we don't know what anything else is called, and the Basques do not speak our particular brand of Esperanto. The hand-dryer in the small shared toilet causes power cuts, painful electric shocks and some mild distress.

1am

My attempts to chat up the bemulleted barman fall on their snot owing to inebriation, insurmountable language barriers and the presence of infinitely more attractive women. Instead I indulge in excited conversation with a charming skinhead in the jacks (who also speaks Esperanto, or perhaps just English).

2am

We acquire cheeseburgers (apparently by magic) and I find police riot helmet on a bin. Eat cheeseburger while wearing helmet and staging mock arrests for photos, sustain punch to the face from brother who has not realised that helmet is child-sized toy replica. Sulk a little.

¿3am?

To the playa we go, full of spirits. I carefully pile my possessions into my helmet and splash around "swimming" like a tipsy sea lion in the shin-deep sea. Greeted by friendly Australians as I stroll home in my bra and knickers, I fail to seize what will turn out to be my best chance to score on this holiday.

Thousands Will Be Disappointed*

I'm afraid I will be welshing on my date with Spencer Tunick. I've got a better offer - I'm flying to Bilbao on the 19th and home again via Biarritz on the 26th. It's just as well, really, I haven't managed to lose that two stone I had planned to lose and my Hollywood is still, well, very Hollywood (for some reason this makes me feel about eleventy million times more exposed than simply being naked).

So no nudie photos of me masquerading as art shall be posted on my blog. You may breathe a sigh of relief/groan in abject disappointment. Annie is planning to capture my radiant beauty in a photograph soon, however, and if her talented hands make me look half presentable I might post her effort here instead. Just so that we have something to look forward to.

*Or possibly just a few of you. There's really no accounting for taste.

Here's Why

I mentioned somewhat flippantly the other day that I intend to take part in Spencer Tunick's installation in Dublin on June 21st. I neglected to explain why.

Some of the people I have told about it since have balked at the idea of taking part, as have some of the bloggers who have written about it. Aonghus is one, and the question he posed was an interesting one: will this "art" be remembered in twenty years time? In a century?

I would argue that yes it will. I will certainly have a memory of the event in 20 years time and I imagine that the other participants will too, as I doubt getting bollock naked in public is an everyday experience for many of them. Whether or not it enters the canon of great works of art remains to be seen. Personally I doubt that it will, but that would in no way dissuade me from taking part. It will be an event - not just a photograph (though I will have a limited edition one of those too, which is something the flatmates would probably prefer I didn't hang in the sitting room).

I have no idea what Tunick's art means, but I'm getting an idea of what it means to me. Aonghus mentioned that the images Tunick has published fill him more with a sense of horror than a sense of wonder and I can understand why. Tunick's photographs, regardless of the artist's intention, represent whatever we choose to see them as metaphors for. For me they can sometimes evoke images of genocide; the beauty of the naked human form smothered in the crowd, sensuous curves and seductive forms suffocated. They speak to me too of more positive things; of shared experience, of simplicity. Of how alien the unclothed body looks when framed by the city. Of vulnerability and fragility. As photos go, they're fierce talkative. But the mere fact of them appeals to me more than anything else. How often do crowds of hundreds, thousands even, come together voluntarily to create a work of art? That gives me a sense of hope.

I'm not one for prancing around in my smalls, much less for prancing around in my nothing-at-alls (I've written before about my insecurities). Taking part in the installation is going to present a major challenge to my confidence. I don't expect that it will help me to overcome my insecurities but at least it encourages me to engage with them. Besides, the rest of the folk there will presumably be suffering the same to a greater or lesser degree (I see mentions of shrinkage, inappropriate erections and - most worryingly - Guinness shits elsewhere) so there's some comfort in that. I chose the two pictures that accompanied my previous post deliberately because they represent my greatest fears about this installation; that we'll have to touch (shivers) or that it will end in a big mucky tangle of limbs (my third choice would have been the one where they're all bent over in rows - essentially looking up the arse of the person in front...). For all my bluster and bravado, it's going to be scary. But already it has opened fresh discussions in unlikely company on body image, self-confidence and decency. On that basis alone I think it is eminently worthwhile.

I think it will be an exceptional experience. I certainly fucking hope so - there's not much that gets me out of bed at 4.30am.

Here's Hoping The Weather's Fine

Touchy Feely
(AKA Düsseldorf 5 (Museum Kunst Palast) 2006)

Dear participant [how clinically formal!]

Thank you for registering to take part in the installation by artist Spencer Tunick in Dublin's Docklands on Saturday June 21st 2008. [no problem! I may chicken out if it rains, though.] We will be contacting you again the week of June 9th 2008 with further information. [tips on etiquette and current body hair trends, maybe?] We look forward to welcoming you to the event in June. [hopefully not with hugs]

Note: The installation will take place at dawn and will take approximately 90 minutes, including travelling to the site of the installation. During this time the participant will be nude for approx 30 minutes. [eek]

Durty
(AKA Brugge 5, 2005)

Fat Bottomed Girls

Like many if not most women, I'm insecure about my shape. My teenage preoccupations were with my feet and my teeth (I still tend to hide my smile when I can) but these days it's all about my size. Small breasts, a soft belly and a lardy bum. My weight is one of the few taboo subjects I have. I will occasionally joke about my fat arse and will often joke about my non-existent diddies but I find I can't speak to anyone about how I really feel about my looks without getting teary eyed. It's embarrassing that at 27 years of age I am still so insecure about it.

Twice recently I have raised it in a very matter-of-fact way with friends and I got the impression that both of them were shocked by what I said. The Jock and I were out carousing and she was telling me about a friend of hers that she wants to set me up with for a blind date. She reckoned we'd be a great match, I wasn't so sure. I was pretty confident that I'd like him, but terrified that he'd meet me and wonder why she had set him up with some fat bird. So I said as much. She looked appalled. The second instance was in a text I sent to GingerBeard; I was smarting from another little disappointment and his sympathetic "his loss" text message elicited an angry "why it's really not his loss" response from me (centering around the fact that I think I'm fat and maybe mental). He got angry with me, disgusted that I'd say such a thing about myself.

I paused in front of the mirror this morning as I dried myself after my shower. Let the towel fall and took a long look at myself. Not posed, not poised, just nude. Drank in the curves, the paler-than-pasty skin, flushed with the heat of the shower. Thought of all the lovers I've had who were less than perfect physical specimens but whom I've lusted after regardless and tried to see myself as a lover might see me.

Beowulf Emasculated

I went to see Beowulf last night, in my latest effort to avoid doing any study in the evenings. It was awful shite altogether (though I'll admit that I thoroughly enjoyed it). The animation was unconvincing, the dialogue was cheesy, Ray Winstone was made to look like a buff Seán Bean. For some reason I had it in my head going in that the film had gotten an 18 certificate, so I was disappointed at the not-very-graphic nature of the violence and positively angry that they kept hiding Beowulf's willy behind candlesticks and such when he was fighting naked with Grendel.

Because there's just not enough violence and willy in films these days.

So, Are You Going Anywhere Nice On Your Holidays?

I'm generally happy enough to make smalltalk. It passes the time, makes people feel more comfortable in forced social situations and gives me endless opportunities to regale strangers with Walter Mitty esque tales of my adventures without having to worry that I'll be found out (who doesn't tell extravagant lies to taxi drivers?). But I hate making smalltalk when in front of a mirror; at the hairdresser's, say, or in the beautician's. Because I can see the lies tripping off my tongue and I redden instantly. I've discovered that I can manage the hairdresser's by pretending to be engrossed in the latest glossy magazine (okay, it's not entirely pretending. Grandad will be disgusted but I too have a morbid fascination with shiny useless objects... WWTDD is often the highlight of my day). The beautician's, however, poses a problem. They have big mirrors fixed on each wall of the treatment room which means that when you go for a bikini wax (like I did this morning) you get a wonderful view of your vagina too. And it's very hard to maintain enough concentration to lie when you're exposed so vulnerably and have a stranger hovering over your lady garden with hot wax and strips of cotton.

So instead of lying I find myself telling her everything. I think my brain panics at the sight of the wax and hopes (in vain) that full disclosure of whatever happens to be in my head will result in some kind of leniency on her part. Smalltalk with strangers doesn't necessarily have to be one lie after another (it's just more fun that way) but it certainly shouldn't consist of the brutal gory truth either. Sinéad does not need to know that I haven't had a wax since the last time I had sex, and that I haven't had sex in a while either. Because beauticians (like hairdressers) are masters of sympathetic flattery and a consolatory reply to a revelation like that goes something like "There there. I'm sure you'll find somebody to ride you eh, you know, soon..." (trails off uncomfortably). I'd say she thinks I'm a right fucking spacer. I think next time I'll pretend to have lost my voice. It'll be a relief for us both.

Operation Lardarse

Vodka has calories! Lots of them! Who knew?

The last month or so of merrymaking has taken its toll on my already less than shapely figure, so now that I've three weeks to kill before I head off on my travels again I've decided to hop on the wagon and lay off the booze (midweek, anyway) and make a conscious effort to lose some podge. Only eating every second day because you've a hangover does not count as a diet, and walking up a few flights of stairs a day is not a substitute for exercise. Yes, there are my amazing bicycling adventures, but let's face it, that's 20 minutes a day. If I walk (oh, the halcyon days when it wasn't pissing rain and I could skip to work and wink at boys on the way!) it's an hour's round trip, which is decent, but given the fine Irish summer we're having, the bike tends to win out.

So this afternoon I decided to expand my repertoire and indulge in my favourite form of exercise, sadly abandoned some months back when our office relocated (it meant that Solas was on my route home -ish- instead of the Markievicz pool). Back in the happy days of my unemployment I swam every day in the local gym's pool, 60 lengths each (mid)morning. Between the gainful employment and the social life I can afford as a result, my standards have slipped and though I made the occasional trip to the Markievicz, it was always a bit half-hearted.

Not so today's expedition. Because you'd have to be pretty fucking determined to go swimming in the public pool in Rathmines. I used my googlemachine to search for photos, but apparently nobody's been that brave.

In fairness, it could have been worse. I didn't swallow any band-aids, and my feet haven't sprouted verrucas just yet. What alarmed me more than the place itself was my attitude to it. When did I become so middle class? I was one of those verrucaed kids, splashing merrily and leaving a trail of scabby plasters in my wake. Suddenly I seem to have morphed into one of those strange birds who strips off to use the communal showers, rather than leaving her togs on to preserve her modestly like any decent god fearin' woman. Though I blame the Belarusian trip for that. Bloody communal showers and lowered inhibitions. I had em off and was merrily lathering my hair before I copped that everyone else was dressed, and staring.

Anyway, other than my Venusian body giving the other water babies a bit of a scare the trip was a relative success. I forgot a hairbrush though, and the fact that public pools tend not to have mirrors or hairdryers, so the half hour walk home had given me a Wurzel Gummidge do by the time I got there. I also had two very fetching rosy cheeks, scalded by the chlorine and the lack of moisturiser (which I had also neglected to bring, quelle surprise).

So there's work to be done, both on the planning and the execution (I didn't manage 60 lengths...). But it's a start.