I completely agree with a lot of what you say. It’s weird how quickly nakedness becomes normal and you wonder what the big deal was. Personally I think our hangups do us some real harm ( shame, guilt, women who won’t breast feed because of the “inconvenience”, etc – maybe the catholic church has a lot to answer for!).

I like the fact you say “Public nudity isn’t widely accepted *yet*.”, maybe it’s just some growing up our culture still has to do.

I’m in the 6th shot down on your “Spencer Tunick in Sydney” post (a looong way back!) – taken outside the Sage in Newcastle. I remember totally buzzing as I walked away and saying I’d do it again if he ever came to my home town of Manchester. Which he is at the beginning of May. Consider me signed up!

Incidentally, at the same time 1700 of us were wandering around Newcastle city centre in the altogether with a police escort, the UK’s own naked rambler was on his second mission to walk the length of the country starkers. He got arrested 20 times, and spent three months in prison. He has since spent another 12 months at her majesty’s pleasure costing us taxpayers hundreds of thousands of pounds.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jan/17/naked-rambler-terror-arrest
Go figure…

Yes, it is a pity there aren’t similar events. There are a number that have cropped up from time to time. The University of Michigan in the US had the Naked Mile which was a fun run conducted in the nude though this was banned in 2000 (http://www.nakedmile.com/home.html). It seems most of the other similar sorts of events have either just disappeared, like the Nude Olympics at Samurai Beach north of Sydney in Port Stephens which use to be held each year but I can’t find any reference to it after about 1994. The rest are mainly protests of various sorts eg San Francisco has it’s Bay to Breakers fun run, like our Sydney City to Surf run, only there is a big crowd that run it naked as a protest about how the naked body should not be portrayed as something to be ashamed of (http://baretobreakers.com/) and the nude bike ride which is held in cities around the world to protest about the environmental concerns about car emissions and increasing traffic. There is one organised for Sydney on Saturday 13 March 2010 to assemble at Archibald fountain in Hyde Park (http://wiki.worldnakedbikeride.org/index.php?title=Sydney). But again the police heavily sensor this event and generally if not arrest, give a stern warning to anyone trying to go in it.

Strangely, I felt really ‘flat’ after the shoot and still not my usual, perky self. It was such an exhilirating and liberating experience with so much positive energy.

I regret not getting there earlier for the tickets to the inside shoot and wondered if I could have somehow slinked in, eg. saying I lost my ticket. Pity too about walking to the Botanic Gardens and missing out on the third shoot.

I would loved to have spoken in more depth to others around me – I came on my own and would have loved to have shared it with my special someone.

Oh well, this forum will have to do (and maybe some othe sites which I’ll check out).

I wish this could be an annual or even once-every-two-years event, but I guess ST has done his dash in Oz. Pity …

Thanks!