Try A Different Pose

By David M. Renka

This book is for people who are curious about how it is to draw someone nude and for those who wonder how it would be to pose nude. It is also for students like the one who shyly turned to me during a photography class and confessed that he felt awkward working with the model; he was afraid of disturbing her. And, what follows is my response to those who upon learning that I am a figurative artist have told me how lucky I am to have an excuse to see “a lot of broads with no clothes on.”  Revised version 2023

• Language: English
• Publisher: David M. Renka
• Release date: May 22, 2014
• ISBN: 9786050303452

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David Renka

Try a different pose revised version

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Table of contents

Try a Different Pose

114

Try a Different Pose

David M. Renka

Copyright 2014 David M. Renka All rights reserved.

Revised 2023

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any

manner without the written permission of the author.

" Ambiguity permits interpretation. Uncertainty forces the imagination to propose its own answers."

What would she look like? An unknown voice on the phone. A friend of mine who used to pose for you said that you were probably looking for a new model. True, he often was. Did she tell you how much I pay? he had asked. Better to deal with the economic question immediately rather than to carry on a complicated negotiation only to be told at the end Oh, sorry, I won’t pose for that amount. Yes, and it’s fine, I’ve never done anything like this before and I’m really more interested in the experience than the money. They had worked out a time for the session. Should he risk embarrassing her by asking if her period might be a problem or just hope for the best? How many times had a model forgotten about her period! He had even started keeping a box of tampons in the studio, just in case.

And you realize that you’ll be posing nude? he’d specify. Then to make it clearer would add, No drapes, no underwear, completely nude. After a couple of awkward experiences, he had become very direct. Oh, but I want to keep my underwear on. I didn’t realize that I was going to have to pose completely undressed, a new model had once said. Obviously, her definition of the word nude differed from his on one not so minor detail. She had to have known that nude meant nude. The person that she’d talked with about posing would certainly have mentioned the completely nude part. That was usually an important aspect of the experience for most non-professional models. It wasn’t that the person always had to be completely nude, not at all, it was the underwear.

Normal everyday underwear inevitably cut into the body, unaesthetically interrupting the continuity of the forms. Of course it was possible to do a wonderful drawing of a person wearing underwear, as long as the presence of the underwear was pertinent to the drawing. The problem, however, was that a person who worried too much about everything showing would have had trouble relaxing. Feeling ill at ease, their movements would have been awkward and unnatural.

Regardless of how someone felt, if they just nonchalantly stripped down and awaited instructions instead of making an issue of it, in a few minutes they would have become forms, proportions, and their relationships. The nude body didn’t leave a lot to the imagination, and anyway, he was there to draw, not to imagine things. It wasn’t a case of seen one seen them all, and the day it was he would quit, but really, just how many bodies had he seen over the years. An occasional model himself he knew that, especially for beginners, those first few minutes could be tough, …hey, I‘m the only person in the room with no clothes on! but it was surprising how soon it began to feel unexpectedly normal. When talking with a person about being a model he always said that if after five or ten minutes into a session they weren’t feeling more at ease, then either posing nude wasn’t for them or else something wasn’t quite right. Bad vibrations or maybe appropriate vibrations inappropriately expressed.

He should have stuck to using professional models, it would have been less stressful. No problem with them, they arrived on time, took their clothes off, and got into the pose. Plus, he didn’t have to worry so much about their being uncomfortable either. If a position was difficult to hold, sorry, that was a part of the job and they were professionals, no? But, the professional wasn’t going to discover anything by posing for him. They would come and go the same person, all in a day’s work. It was different with someone who wasn’t a professional. They would arrive nervous, excited, worried, surprised at themself for what they were about to do but happy about it too, and as the session progressed there would be a change in them. They would become less self-conscious but more conscious of themself. And would start to enjoy the strange mixture of feelings, memories of childhood innocence when they could be naked and no one thought anything about it blending with sensations of adult sexuality. At the end, they would go away, still a little amazed, and call their friends, Do you know what I did this afternoon? He would become an event in their life, to be talked about, laughed about, and looked back upon. The emotions of someone new and their excitement were a refreshing break from the solitude of the studio.

Three hours, four if he was planning to do something particularly complicated. He mentally ran through the usual pep talk that he would give before they started. Once you get into the pose, don’t move. Imagine that I’m looking at you through a grid of horizontal and vertical lines. Where is your nose in relation to your right knee? Is your left elbow higher or lower than your navel? If you move something in the middle of the session, you’ll throw everything off. A drawing isn’t done in sections. I don’t finish one part then move on but I am always working everywhere and constantly rechecking the relationships, so don’t move. If you need to scratch something let me know and we’ll work it out. The poses will probably be very comfortable or very quick but if something starts hurting you, tell me. I don’t want this to become a torture session. If at some point between poses you need to go to the bathroom or want a drink of water, fine, don’t sit there suffering, say something. By the way, I’m not particularly interested in pornography, whatever that is, so it shouldn’t be a problem, but if for some reason a pose makes you uncomfortable let me know. I’m sure that we can find a pose that is equally as interesting that doesn’t embarrass you. That was important, especially for a new model. The rules of posing were vague. Were they signing a blank check? How much of them had the artist bought? Did they have the right to say that they didn’t like a certain position or was that unprofessional? Would the artist get mad? Send them away? Refuse to pay them?

Only once had a model been worried. Whatever you want is okay except that I don’t want to pose with my legs spread wide apart. It would embarrass me even if I had underwear on. That wasn’t going to be a problem. He usually liked a certain naturalism in the poses, and someone sitting there with their legs wide open wasn’t in a very natural pose, especially in the case of a woman. Visually though, the spread-legged pose was actually quite an interesting challenge, even more so if he were off-center so that he had the sole of one foot towards his face and the other leg extending out diagonally. Two different sets of forms, along with a challenging bit of foreshortening. He could make it even harder by putting the model on a table and drawing while seated on a low chair. Still, it was a loaded subject.

Freud had once written that sometimes an umbrella was just an umbrella. Well, sometimes a pose was just a pose too. He happened to like that configuration, no desire to shock or strike a blow for freedom of expression. Still, no matter how well it came out, a masterful understanding of the foreshortening, a fresh and lively line, unusual placement on the paper, whatever, for ninety-nine point nine percent of the people who saw it, that position would never be just a pose. They would be too distracted by the scene to appreciate the aesthetic qualities of the drawing.

He remembered an incident from years ago. A new friend had invited him to a picnic in the local park. It had been fun until, to his horror, the guy had stood up and announced Afterwards I’m going to divide you all into groups and each one has to invent an impromptu comedy sketch around a given subject. Had he known beforehand he probably would not have been sitting there in that park!

This could happen to a model too. He or she would arrive and undress expecting a normal session. Instead, Today the theme is bondage and I’m going to tie you up! While it is true that after those first few minutes an initially shocking pose often became just another pose and that after a few more minutes even a boring pose, it was always better for the model to arrive already prepared for those first few minutes! Except for things like an unexpected birthday gift or some special treat to eat during a break models, especially nude models, generally don’t like surprises.

Sure, I’d be willing to pose for you, a young woman had once told him. If you want to draw me dressed it’s this much but if you want to see me nude the price goes up. It must have seemed logical to her. The more someone wanted to see the more they had to pay. And true enough, art schools did it like that. The person sitting there staring out into space while ten or fifteen students did their portrait earned less than their colleague who lay nude on a pile of cushions. Sorry, that’s not how I work, he had responded. While an art teacher usually had a specific lesson in mind, Today you are going to draw a nude model. or In this lesson I’m going to teach you how to photograph a face. sometimes he wasn’t sure what he would have done in a session until the model had arrived, and at times not even then! A lot depended upon how he felt and how he reacted to that model that day. It might happen, and had happened, that he would have spent the entire session drawing the model’s hands or feet. Now, if I can have your whole body for this amount what do you charge for just one foot? he had been tempted to ask the young woman. By the way, if I want you dressed but with one breast showing do you charge for them separately or do I have to pay for the complete set? Impractical, absurd and at times a bit too carnal, he didn’t like considering a body in those terms. Look, I don’t buy pieces of a body, I buy a block of time. Plus, if you think that there is something so special about seeing your private parts then charging someone merely a few dollars more an hour to look at them does seem kind of …well, you know…and instead, if your breasts and vulva are merely parts of your body then why the additional charge?

She had disappeared. Oh well, he had thought, then a few days later she had gotten back in contact. I’d like to try doing a session if you are still interested. Would next Saturday be okay?

A lot of artists structured their sessions quite rigidly. Twenty or thirty minutes of work then a short break for the model. And, halfway through the session a longer break. Coffee or tea? In the beginning he had done it like that too. So bohemian, the artist and the nude model chatting together, though there was always the risk of the model dropping sugar in their pubic hair or scalding themself by spilling hot coffee down their nude body. However, early on he had realized that both he and the person posing had to follow the flow of whatever he was trying to do that particular day. So, unless there was an emergency there was no way that he was going to arbitrarily interrupt a session just because a certain amount of time had passed. Except with a very long pose, the break was at the end of it and not in the middle.

During a break he would offer the model a glass of water and a piece of candy. The candy jar always provoked a smile. A light-hearted gesture that added a touch of humor, especially when he said, See what happens when you accept candy from a stranger! And sometimes a model needed a shot of energy, he too for that matter. He had tried cookies, but quickly discovered that eating cookies produced crumbs which ended up all over the platform making the next pose really uncomfortable. Pieces of candy worked better, no crumbs! My goodness, I didn’t know they still made these. My grandmother used to give them to me when I went to visit her as a child, one model had said, happily unwrapping a particular piece of candy and sliding twenty years back in time.

While he felt that within certain limits a person had the right to do what they wanted without asking anyone else’s permission, he did not want to be the cause of arguments nor end up in the middle of them. Look, life as an artist is already complicated enough as it is. Do I need to worry about someone that you are involved with causing a scene or trashing my studio because you are posing nude for me? he might ask a person who was thinking about posing. Theirs would be an artist/model relationship not a tryst, so what was there for anyone to get upset about? Still, some people had trouble with the artist/model relationship when it involved he’s going to see you naked!

Funny how when people thought about an artist with a nude model they always seemed to focus on the artist. Was the artist getting excited? Thinking about sex with the model? Nobody ever seemed to consider that while the artist was desperately trying to understand and render a very complicated series of forms and their relationships to each other the model, who couldn’t do anything but think, was thinking. How many times had a model fantasized about him losing interest in the drawing and leaping on them instead? Or imagined his hands on their body, artists knew how to use their hands, their roughness contrasting with the gentleness of their touch. Tension in the face, glistening skin, ambiguous suggestions of who knows what thoughts, though he knew from experience that it was probably pain or boredom. And as a male model he knew what they thought about. Last night’s movie, homework, classes, summer vacation, earning money, anything to avoid publicly demonstrating their virility!

There was a curious contradiction about posing nude. Most people wanted to be considered sexually desirable, except for when they were standing there posing with no clothes on. Then they wanted to be neutral. A friend told me that for you artists a model was like a kind of mannequin, she had said, seeking reassurance as she undressed. Hey, wait, stop undressing and sit down. Years ago I often posed and if some artist, male or female, had looked at my virile, young nude body and said that I made them think of a mannequin I would have felt really insulted. And, if you had reminded me of a plastic dummy the other night when we met at that party you certainly wouldn’t be here today! While we’re on the subject let me correct what your friend said. Artists have feelings too. In fact, if I were unmarried and thirty years younger and if I weren’t so interested in doing a drawing of you, I might even have asked you out on a date instead. Now, if you’re not too shocked could we get on with the session? Smiling broadly, she had stood up, removed her remaining clothes, and strolled over to the platform.

He looked at the clock, still too early, and then went over to the table where he had laid out his drawing materials. Several hardnesses of pencils already sharpened, kind of dumb to pay a model to watch him sharpen pencils, a few conté crayons, colored pencils, two small cups of watercolor, one diluted and one very concentrated. Which technique? Hard to decide in advance. He was paying so he had bought the right to fail and could experiment if he wanted. That made it easier. Sometimes people posed in exchange for a drawing, and he had to be damn sure to come up with at least one good drawing or it was going to be very embarrassing.

A session could be so unpredictable. One day, for no apparent reason at all, it would be magical and everything that he did would come out great. Exhilarating when that happened. He would become more and more keyed up and across the room the model would feel it in the air and get caught up in the excitement too. The next session he would put on the same music hoping to re-create the magic, and instead the session would be just okay. Occasionally it could be total agony, and he would usually realize it within the first drawing. Oh God, I have two and a half more hours of this ahead of me. Half-completed drawings torn up because the beginning had been so bad that there was no possibility of saving them. Apologies to the model. It’s not your fault, you’re wonderful as a model, this happens sometimes. He would stand there with a flaccid pencil in his hand desperately attempting to calm down enough to get back in control again and make it work.

Bad session today? she had whispered to him, more a statement than a question. Yeah, he had responded, coming back to the present. How could you tell? Your expression. You look like you’re watching someone throw up. And if you don’t loosen your grip on that glass it’s going to shatter in your hand. Sorry, but you know how I feel about my work, he said, then had ordered the various muscles in his face to relax. He could never just write off a bad session. Oh well, so what. It’ll go better the next time. Instead, he took it personally. Doubt would set in. He was kind of hit and miss in his work. When he was good he could be very good, even slightly breathtakingly good, but when he missed, thank goodness for