Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2001/03/10

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Subject: RE: [Leica] Re: A REPLACEMENT TOPIC
From: "Mark Cohen" <markc@binaryfaith.com>
Date: Sat, 10 Mar 2001 13:56:55 -0800

What about Jock Sturges http://www.agallery.com/sturges.html and Sally Mann.
They both took pictures of Nude children (With their parents (and
permission)..

Robert Mappelthorpe too took photos of nude boys. (With their parents
permission) There is one in the Perfect Moment.

I think its perfectly acceptable to take pictures of nude people of ALL
ages. (Though Im sure I wouldn't want to see my grandmother like that, Im
sure someone has done it and it was art)

I would think the only RULE that be approriate here would be don't take
pictures of nude people w/o written consent.

- -Mark *Who has yet to get anyone to take off their clothes for his camera.
:( * Cohen





- -----Original Message-----
From: owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
[mailto:owner-leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us]On Behalf Of Michael E.
Bérubé
Sent: Saturday, March 10, 2001 1:01 PM
To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us
Subject: [Leica] Re: A REPLACEMENT TOPIC


As one who on occasion is hired to shoot photographs of naked adults
engaged in all manner of playful activities, this seems to me a really
SIMPLE rule....Don't photograph anyone under the age of consent (in the US
that is 18) in any manner that could be considered sexually provocative nor
without their genitalia fully covered (unless they are running from their
just Napalm'd village and you are a PJ trying to show the horror of
that.)  Period.

While Art is Art and shouldn't be constrained, the law here (Title 18 USC
in the States) needs to be specifically unambiguous to protect the
innocent. I don't even shoot the type of photos that my parents took of me
at 2yo (on the "potty chair" looking all proud and nekkid at the beach
playing in the waves etc,...) of my grrrls because 1) it will embarrass the
Hel out of them later and 2) I don't need even the CHANCE that they will be
misconstrued as something other than innocuous family snaps.

While I sympathize with the grandmother caught up in the system on this
sort of technicality, I feel very little sympathy for a professional
photographer (who should know about the gray area here) and who is nailed
for ignoring this common sense rule because they think themselves
artistically above it.

Carpe Luminem,
Michael E. Bérubé

Replies: Reply from "B. D. Colen" <bdcolen@earthlink.net> (Re: [Leica] Re: A REPLACEMENT TOPIC)