Stripping Down, for Art

Last week, I was invited to both observe and participate in a photo shoot for a young abstract artist named Reisha Perlmutter. Taken by the artist herself, the photos were to serve as studies for her upcoming solo show Immerse at Roman Fine Art. 

The thing about Perlmutter is that she paints women, and she paints them very, very bare; a nudity in the name of empowerment, biology, liberty. 

So I jumped in the pool and got naked. I felt the chill brush of the water touch spaces beneath my one piece that I hadn't felt since... the last time I went skinny-dipping. To me, there are few things more satisfying than stripping away garments that force body-consciousness. They bind and mask, diluting the buoyant physical and emotional freedom of existence and play. Getting naked removed the S/M/L labels, removes the stigma and breaks down barriers. No one ever has to say "hey! eyes up here" while indicating north of their junk. Pools, creeks, streams, lakes, rivers; alone or with like-minded folks. I've been naked and it's been good. 

As Perlmutter snapped photos, I swam, aimlessly and nakedly, feeling every current and swirl lick the skin on my forearms, belly, thighs. I swam in circles, I swam north to south and back again; I tried to touch the bottom, but I didn't stay down long. When I would surface, my face would break through probing tongues of wetness, and for a split second even the warm air seemed cool. I was unaware, carefree, weightless. 

That's what Perlmutter depicts when she paints her nude bathers – buoyant, carefree women free-floating in pools of water and bliss. One of the only directions she gives to her models is "pretend like you're 15 years-old again," and the realization of what I could have felt like at 15 dawned on me. I could have felt beautiful, and weightless, and more than the confines of my body. 

When you look at Perlmutter's paintings, you sense the weightlessness. You feel every sunbeam dance across the swimmer's body, and witness the private serenity of total submersion. I had the opportunity to feel those things and experience my own form of weightlessness. My burdens were lifted when I stripped off my clothing, I felt the refracting light trace my finite body and expand through the impossible blue water into the universe. I was one of Perlmutter's ladies in the water and, despite the camera lens, I've never felt so serene.