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Would you take a naked photo of your pregnant self? Credit: Photodisc
Girls gone ... preggers?
These women are naked, but they're not posing for sleazy videos. More like the family album.
For some Japanese women, it has become fashionable to immortalize their pregnancy with nude portrait shots, according to Reuters News Service.
However, the portraits are strictly private. In the land of the sumo wrestler, a big tummy can be a big turn on. Such a turn on that three years ago the Japanese government demanded the removal of a subway poster featuring a nude and pregnant Britney Spears because, they said, it might arouse male commuters. No drooling on the platform, please.
Yomiko Yoda is not interested in becoming a subway poster. She gave birth to a son on July 19 and has nude photos documenting her pregnancy, but they're only for home display.
"Whenever I see these pictures, I can recall how I looked and how happy I was when I was pregnant," she told Reuters. "This moment will not come back to me, and these pictures are for my own enjoyment."
| Yes! | |
|---|---|
| Maybe, maybe not. I'm not telling. | |
| No, but I would. | |
| No. I just don't think it's right. |
Still, it might have been a nude celebrity that touched off this trend. The Japanese pop singer Hitomi posed nude when she was pregnant and the image showed up on Tokyo billboards to promote her new album last June. A subsequent photo book sold some 10,000 copies during its first week of publication.
"When I opened my studio for maternity photos last year, we had less than 10 customers per month," photographer Natsuko Takada told Reuters. "But last month we had 70 customers." At Takada's studio, the price for such photos is around 35,000 yen, which is equivalent to about $368.
Celebrating the naked pregnant body is nothing new, of course. American artist Alice Neel painted a series of portraits of naked, pregnant women, including her own daughter-in-law.
'I thought the whole picture of woman without pregnancy is trivial," Keel said. "It's treating woman as sex object.
"But you know, sex results in something."
As for me, I don't even like being photographed in shorts, so I'm wondering if this is an American trend. Your thoughts?
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ReaderComments (Page 1 of 2)
8-05-2009 @ 4:36PM
Karen said...This is not a new trend. I worked as a photographer and we did pregnancy photos all the time.
I think the upswing started when Demi Moore posed pregnant on Vanity Fair.
Reply
8-05-2009 @ 11:37PM
Gurlfrnd said...I think pregnancy is a wonderful, beautiful, amazing thing. It should be celebrated and cherished everywhere...esp. when it includes the pictures of the journey! It IS amazing and should be captured!
8-05-2009 @ 5:43PM
Julie said...Although I understand the natural beauty that some people see in a pregnant woman, I would have to say that many women do not FEEL beautiful when "front-carrying" an extra 30+ pounds. I would place pics like this in the same category as home movies of the actual birth (or even better than that, pages in the family scrapbook album depicting the event). That category would be "pictures that you should probably not ever let your children see". For me, the beauty of birth was the moment I first held each of my children. I don't need memories my body being distorted and pummeled for 9 months. Although....come to think of it....a picture like those mentioned in the article would have been the last one of me taken without the road map of stretch marks that have become my battle wounds of motherhood. Maybe that is not such a bad idea after all......!
Reply
8-05-2009 @ 11:49PM
Jay said...Actually, you SHOULD let your children see those pictures! They're going to have to see that stuff eventually. Besides, it does them more damage to NOT show them. If it's an album of pictures of them being conceived, I can understand not letting them see it. But they all should be able to witness the nude posing and childbirth
8-06-2009 @ 11:02AM
italprincess said...I personally would never have thought of taking nude pregnancy pictures, but now on reflection, it would have been cool to catch one where you can see the ouline of a foot or hand poking out. That would have been amazing to catch on film. To show your child when they are older.
8-06-2009 @ 6:18AM
Ashley said...It's kind of sad that people are so able to sexualize everything (consciously or not). Nudity and pregnancy are two of the most natural things in life. I've never been pregnant (I'd like to enjoy being a 17 year old for as long as possible) but when I do get married and have children, I'll probably take quite a few pictures documenting my pregnancy (probably just exposing the belly, if anything at all). I dont see why anybody would hide such a thing from a child, unless there was a sexual motive behind the pictures in the first place.
Also, this trend has been around as longer than I have, with Britney Spears, Demi Moore, and all of those nude paintings and sculptures from hundreds to thousands of years ago. I dont think we can really call it new.
8-05-2009 @ 8:48PM
Kent said...People in my housing complex think I am weird because I am a 'house nudist'. I live on the top floor and the windows are protected by a row of full pines planted half a century ago and I use heavy curtains. I am not an exhibitionist. I just made the mistake of mentioning the reason I took so long to answer the door for the maintenance guy that I had to put some clothes on that it naturally got around. (Don't let guys call you gossips ladies. Most of the real gossip in this compound is carried by MEN!) Nothing wrong with nudity at all. I feel more awkward being clothed.
Reply
8-05-2009 @ 9:15PM
Melissa said...What does that have to do with the article?
8-05-2009 @ 9:14PM
Melissa said...There is nothing sexual at all about those photos. They are beautiful. I know a lot of women don't feel that way when they are pregnant, but I did. If I have another child, I want a picture of my big ol' belly! Thank goodness my sister is a photographer! ;}
Reply
8-06-2009 @ 2:06AM
Kent said...My comment was about nudity being natural. Obviously, I've never been prenant ! I posted about the beauty of pregnancy, but AOL must have lost it somewhere. I know a lot of women feel 'ugly' during pregnancy and I have never understood that. I think most women 'glow' during pregnancy.
8-05-2009 @ 9:30PM
Jo said...I find the pregnant portraits beautiful & emotional, but feel they should be for the parents and immediate family. They are very intimate and personal!
Reply
8-05-2009 @ 9:53PM
GAIL COOPER said...I have "a sneaking suspicion" that these photos are more of a "turn on" in American culture than most people are willing to admit. In America, the media has "brainwashed" the masses into accepting a somewhat limited standard of beauty. Pregnancy is as natural as breathing and why should it not be considered beautiful? If a woman chooses to visually document her pregnancy, it should not be frowned upon. It's her choice.
Reply
8-05-2009 @ 10:08PM
karen said...Ladies, respect your bodies! No one else needs to see you but your husbands.
Reply
8-05-2009 @ 11:49PM
Jay said...You are respecting your bodies when you do this. Listen ladies, your husbands should not be the only one who can see you like that! We all should be allowed to see your nude figures. And for "Doing it (in bed, you know, THAT)," that's another story! That's something you should only do with your spouse!
8-05-2009 @ 10:56PM
ash said...Wow you people are out there. It is depicting LIFE. I have taken a picture monthly since I have been pregnant. And different people see it in their own way, but I do not feel there is anything wrong with it at all. Just because a woman poses nude while she is pregnant does not mean anything negative about her. And yes more guys in America are turned on by pregnancy then we are led to believe....I have never been hit on more in my life! Pregnancy is beautiful and all you A holes who think otherwise.......you don't appreciate life as much as you should
Reply
8-05-2009 @ 10:50PM
Jen said...When I was pregnant, I got the nude pregnancy photos done and also some more modest ones of my husband and I. It was a special time for us because the pregnancy was very hard and we had to go through a lot of infertility treatments. The photos are beautiful and commemorate a special moment. There is nothing sleazy or gross about them and not all woman look bad when they are pregnant. I actually looked very good. Its all about taking care of yourself and having pride and comfort with your body.
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8-05-2009 @ 11:01PM
dave said...Sure you have a studio... You are probably some sick freak who gets off to pics. like that.
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8-05-2009 @ 11:09PM
Jim said...Me and my wife did it. Have them of her semi-nude and pregnant hanging up in my closet, it's personal. Did it for both pregnancies. Will give the large framed photos to the kids when they are older.
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8-10-2009 @ 12:16AM
Wayne said...I agree this is not new. I took my wifes photo way before Demi Moore did it. It was taken 28 years ago and won a first place in a photo contest at a local bank. You can see it at http://www.Tiddybear.com and look at the section about us. I also took my daughter photo the night before she had our grandson. Of course back then they would not publish it, so they published my second and honorable mention instead. Ther is nothing wrong with pregnant photography. Its not sex people and besides that's how we all get here.
Reply
8-05-2009 @ 11:34PM
anon said...Thats a really nice sentiment. Also nice when someone takes a picture of you without you having to ask. I wish my husband wanted to document my growing belly. Kinda hard to take one yourself - I guess I should of just went to a portrait studio and got them done for myself.
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