Feminism Without Clothes

So, I’m moving to Seattle in less than two weeks.  I’ve been faced with the following dilema: what and how much does one tell one’s potential roommate regarding what they do for a living?

After not much luck with the apartment/roommate search, I went on craig’s list a couple of weeks ago and posted the following, mostly as a joke:

Okay, I tried the normal ad. Now’s the honest one.I’m moving to Seattle. I need a place to stay April 2nd til the 1st of May. Why pick me?

Because you will never, ever have the chance to live with a professional nude/fetish model ever again. I have lots of great stories about the people who photograph me when I’m naked and/or tied up. You can tell all your friends that a nude model is renting out one of your rooms.

I don’t walk around naked. I’m not going to sleep with you. I’m easy-going, a night owl, and a bit of a homebody. Basically, a normal, average person who happens to be a nude model.

And that’s why, out of all the other normal, average people who are looking for a place to stay for a month, you should rent a room out to me.

The resulting emails: priceless.

I didn’t find a place to live, though.

Melvin Moten, Febuary 2007.      

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There is a scam in the Richmond, Virginia area involving a photographer who currently goes by “Fokus-Foto;” his real name is Jim.  He either books a gig with you and no-shows, or shoots you and then scrams without paying you.  The Richmond police are well aware of his actions- and who he is- but haven’t done anything about it.  He still does this to models.

He’s done this to a lot- and I mean a lot- of models.  So, how does he keep getting away with it?

There’s an amount of shame involved in admitting to someone that you’re a nude model who gets most of her work online to authorities; you think that people will judge you.  You worry that they’ll think you’re both stupid and a whore for being willing to do things like that on camera.

And, these fears are not entirely unfounded.  If the context was different, I’m guessing that the response would have been different from the police.  But, since it is nude/erotic models that are getting scammed, it puts things in a different and less than flattering light in some people’s eyes.

After all, you’re just a girl who took her clothes off for a stranger for money, right?

 

 

 

Mickle Design Werks, February 2007.    

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Last summer, when I first went full-time art modeling, I had a photographer in the Richmond, Virginia area- “Fokus-Foto”- stand me up without a word; it caused me to lose what on my budget is a good deal of money.

When he no-showed on me, I wrote an entry here about it. A couple of months later, I got an email from a girl who had shot with him- he left without giving her any money. When she went down to the police station to report it, they knew of him. Basically, he’s a scam- he either stands you up or takes photos of you and then doesn’t pay you.

He goes through different venues to find models and do this to them; when I noticed that a model on myspace was scheduled to shoot with him, I wrote her to warn her.  She never wrote me back.

That was, until yesterday, when he did the same thing to her.  She also lost money- twice the amount that I did, and it appears that she’s on a budget similar to my own.

When it happened to me, I was pissed.  I posted his phone number and email in this blog.  Later, I felt bad- like I had sunk down to his level, and that I should just get on with things and be the better person.  I removed the personal information about him I had revealed.  At the time, however, I did not know the extent of this scam.

This blog is fairly popular; it’s big enough to be found if you google certain phrases or words.  Now it can be found by the phrase Fokus-Foto.

The photographer’s name is Jim, and he goes by “Fokus-Foto,” among other names.  Models, if you are contacted by him, do not shoot with him.  He’s located near Richmond, Virginia.

He’s good.  He knows the names of the local models and is familiar with various photographers.  He might mention a place where is work is shown, or something else that makes him seem legitimate.  He will be in contact with you by phone and email right up until the very second he no-shows on you; if he shows and takes your photos, he will appear to be the real deal.  But he’ll scram without giving you any money.

If you are contacted by someone who might be this guy, ask for him to put down a deposit or pay for your train ticket and/or hotel room ahead of time.  Ask for the phone numbers, not just emails, of references.

There’s nothing I can really do about it; the money I spent last summer is gone.  I just don’t want it to happen to another person.

 

 

 

David Le Beck, January 2007.    

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Welcome to the fourth in a series of posts highlighting the wonderful photographers I’ve had the pleasure of working with in my career thus far.

Spotlight: D. Brian Nelson

One of the first things Don did when he finally got me alone in a motel room in Los Angeles was point to a bed and gruffly say, “Start playing with yourself.”  I did, and he took pictures.  He was kind enough to buy me dinner, too.

Don is famous for, among other things, taking photos of women masturbating in hotel rooms. He later posts them in his aptly named “Hotel Room Nudes” blog.

He was supposed to be the second photographer I shot with, but fate (and a canceled trip to DC) prevented it from being so.  We kept track of each other through our blogs; when I made the decision to go to LA for a week in January, I emailed the San Diego-based photographer with the subject line “LA is almost San Diego…”

So, a year later than previously planned, we met and shot together.  I felt a little intimidated- here was a big photographer who’s read every entry in my blog, and he’s going to take the most explicit pictures of me ever taken before.  Several people told me, “I can’t wait to see what the two of you come up with!”

I’ll let you be the judge. 

Thanks, Don.

 

 

 

 

January 2007, D. Brian Nelson.     

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Welcome to the third in a series of posts highlighting the wonderful photographers I’ve had the pleasure of working with in my career thus far.

Spotlight: Allen Martin, aka Martini.

I’ve worked with New York-based photographer Allen Martin twice, and both times the results have been extraordinary.

We first shot together on my very first overnight trip to NYC; I did not plan to work with him.  The Saturday of my trip that I was shooting with another photographer- and another model named Isobel Wren.  Isobel and I had never met before, but hit it off.  She was running behind that day- she had a TFP/CD shoot later that evening that she was already late for.  She asked if I’d like to come along. 

Get naked for free for a photographer who’s name I didn’t recall or whose work I couldn’t picture at the time?  Although it doesn’t sound so great now, it seemed like a good idea at the time.

So, not one but two models eventually found there way to the doorstep of Marty’s apartment.

“Isobel felt so bad about being late that she brought me along to make up for it,” I explained.

Eventually, Isobel had to leave to catch a bus; Marty and I continued to shoot.  We would eventually shoot for a second time on my next visit.

Much of his shooting is done in a bathroom-less water damaged room in the basement of his building.  It doesn’t look like much when you get there, but it photographs spectacularly.  He’d explain to me that he liked shooting ball gowns and such against it because of the dramatic contrast.

Marty was kind enough to send me some “G”-rated shots of myself (I had been complaining about how I needed some for my portfolio).  I sent one of them to my mom- when I asked her about it, she remarked that she loved it; in fact, she googled the photographer’s name, and his work was amazing!

I’d later tell him, “my mom likes your work.”

 

 

 

Martini, December 2006.    

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Welcome to the second in a series of posts highlighting the wonderful photographers I’ve had the pleasure of working with in my career thus far.

Spotlight: Moraxian.

Moraxian is, in my eyes, a legend regarding “damsel in distress” genre of bondage photography.  The list of models he’s worked with goes on and on.  If there’s a model out there who does bondage, chances are that he’s tied her up and photographed her.  He’s shot with at least one model 18 times.

There are several reasons for this.  The first is that he’s absolutely mastered this genre.  The second is that he’s obviously passionate about it- after hundreds and hundreds of shoots, you’d have to be!  And the third is that he’s just about the nicest guy you could possibly hope to meet.

On our second shoot together (we’ve shot three times), I brought a friend along that was curious about what a bonadge photoshoot was like.  Moraxian tied her up, too.  Later she confessed to me that the shoot wasn’t at all what she expected; that she was expecting something sleazy.  Of course, what she found was a nice photographer with a passion for purple nooses, among other things.

If I was going to recommend a photographer to someone who had never done a bondage shoot before, Moraxian would be at the very top of my list.

I hope he’s not upset that I’ve blown his cover.  Perhaps he’s only truly evil when he’s not shooting restrained women.

This picture is from my favorite series of photos that Moraxian and I have shot together- so far. 

 

 

 

 

Photography by Moraxian, of Moraxian’s Gameroom, September 2006.  P.S. You can see my some more of my work with Moraxian here and here.   

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A phenomenon I like to refer to as “one-sided intimacy” occurs when you choose to make yourself- or part of yourself- visible on the internet.

By both blogging and modeling, I’ve given people a small glimpse into my life- I only share what I want to share, but it makes people feel as if they know me.

Except that I have no idea who they are.

I’ve gotten long letters deconstructing modeling, feminism, sex, and the views I’ve expressed here.  I’ve been asked out multiple times- when it happened the first time, I wrote a blog entry about my boyfriend, partly in the hopes that it would express that I was clearly unavailable to various would-be internet suitors.

Online, boundaries are dissolved.  I recently received a long, very detailed email from someone wanting to explore my orgasms with me.  When I responded that it was my policy to only discuss the quality of my orgasms with my current partner, he responded, “I completely hear you…in fact, I’m the same.”

People who feel that they know me also sometimes feel that I’m obligated to share more with them.  “Why are you moving to Seattle?”  None of your business, internet stranger.

Many fail to realize that this is my persona, not me- people who read this blog on a regular basis have an excellent idea of who Candy Poses is, but not who the person with the name on my passport is. 

So, we’re both strangers to each other, in reality.

 

 

January 2007, David Le Beck.   

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