Finally I finished working over ChoCho’s nude photo session. Doing that I realized, it is, at certain times, irrelevant what is depicted on an image. More important seems to be: who took the image? or better: who created it? If it is a painting, these days, it is not such a big deal anymore, because nobody cares any longer about painting, so we’re fine. But what if it is a photograph? Well. Photographs are real, or seem real anyways, which is the same thing, seems the same thing, which once again: ends up as being the same in real hands-on-life, and real is serious. Now, when I say “who”, that is also a bit misleading, depends on your personal perspective on the meaning of human life on earth. It would be much better if I say: “What gender does the person have, that created xyz image?” And then an additional and very important sub-question is: “What sexual orientation does the person have, who created xyz image?”

A; For instance: if I am a man, who creates a photograph of another man, who has to be nude, or it would never count, because we have to visually express that we are thinking about sex here. So, ready? OK, let’s try again: so you are a man, who takes a photograph of another nude man (“nude”, btw. is the elegant expression if you at first wanted to say “naked”, but then got afraid too many electronic web crawlers are going to spam your site with the wrong association; these days an electronic machine audience is much more influential than actual human beings and their opinions), and you told everyone either verbally or by life-style (lifestyle is much less suspicious, so better stick to that!) that you are what is called “heterosexual”, then such a photograph, particularly if you made the wise choice to shoot black&white (avoid colour even if at night standing in front of your bathroom mirror you would honestly say what you see in the mirror looks like it’s truly in colour), this photograph would be read by the eager audience as a form of a brave self portrait, full of insight and very, very deep (= a very good thing!)

Josiane Keller “ChoCho’s back 10” (2016)

Josiane Keller “mehrmalige Gotteslästerung” (2016)

Josiane Keller “ChoCho sitting looking at me 4” (2016)

B; If you are a man and you took the very same photograph of another nude man, BUT (the BUT makes the difference, so listen up!), BUT you have told everyone verbally or by life-style (verbally is much less offensive, so better stick to that!) that you are what is called “gay” (the old-fashioned word used to be “homosexual”, but in modern linguistics that is not only out of style, it is also by now a touchy expression, because now those people using it take on a touch of narrow-minded, uncool and potentially very, very much in-the-closet, so better stick to the word: “gay”), then such a photograph would be read by our culture hungry audience also as brave, but not as a self-portrait at all, instead you have obviously visually expressed your desire, and in the case that you are a gay man this type of desire is not considered a physical one, but instead an intellectual one (again: you’re more plausible if you shoot black&white) and it’s just as good as applying for a PhD somewhere cool. In other words: you did great, even better than if you told everyone you are only a hetero photographer.

Josiane Keller “mehrmalige Gotteslästerung” (2016)

Josiane Keller “danseur burlesque 4” (2016)

Josiane Keller “ChoCho’s chest” (2016)

C; Now. In the case you are a woman, and then you take the very same photograph of a naked, sorry, I meant nude man, and everyone thinks you sleep with men, because in the case of women the idea of “bisexual” never really grew roots, women being those shady little creatures that sleep in their experimental sexual phase (which could be basically at any time of your life, even if it does not necessarily apply at all times of your life) with either gender, and so with much gusto and without discrimination, then your photo or if you made more than one, your photos are: kinky, banal, yet will gladly be taken up in a coffee-table book, possibly accompanying a solo show some place, but the same coffee table book will end six months later on the $5 clearance table and the gallery will no longer talk to you after that, unless you repeat success #1 and take a second series of another naked, sorry: nude (!) man. In this case you should shoot in colour and avoid black&white, because they will simply not believe you and consequently overlook you, if you do.

You will anyways not be taken serious as an artist at all /ever, BUT: you will earn a steady income if you continuously manage finding good looking male models to work with, and you can make more cheap books and a few calendar. Which is maybe not even your worst bet, rent has to be paid, next to that very model of yours, you are aware of that already, I’m sure of it.

Josiane Keller “mehrmalige Gotteslästerung” (2016)

Josiane Keller “ChoCho’s nipple and tattoo” (2016)

Josiane Keller “ChoCho’s eyes and lips” (2016)

D; If you are that type of woman that is known everywhere as a lesbian, and to do that you will have to really invest a little bit more than all the other categories: you will have to look like a lesbian, ideally God gave you already a sort of stout physique, tall and slim is not useful at all! You better cut all your hair off real short, check with low rank military, they always have great style ideas to copy; and you should talk with a low and loud voice. If the good Lord created you in his own image just a tic too feminine, judged by visual assessment of others, you can sleep with as many women as you like, it will never do. You will still never find recognition as a lesbian no matter what, so better work on yourself.
But let’s say even if you passed the fierce assessment of the crowd and everyone can see: “this girl is a lesbian, no doubt, check: X” and now you took a photograph of a naked man, (if you are an acknowledged lesbian you must be a bit more diamond-in-the-rough-style and you can’t use the word “nude” any more, you better say “naked” instead!), then this picture will be considered simply as you goofing around with your homo buddies, probably you guys had a bit too much to drink that afternoon in your bohemian life style, that is what you anyways do on a daily basis; nothing happened between the two of you, obviously, and that is why the picture or the whole series of pictures it is artistically insignificant, and in this case it is irrelevant if you shoot in colour or black&white, so you might as well save yourself the modelling fee and studio rent.
Take photographs of horses instead, I recommend stallions, if you find any, or dogs, or monkeys (either one in colour, for sure!), it will be better for your career.

Josiane Keller “mehrmalige Gotteslästerung” (2016)

Josiane Keller “da Juchitzer 2” (2016)

Josiane Keller “ChoCho sitting looking at me 2” (2016)

E; HERE is a trick I am telling it to you right now. As a woman that can’t help but sleep predominately with men, and the couple of occasions when you had relationships with women really do not count, life is like that, sorry, see above, but don’t worry, because what you could do instead is take photographs of nude homosexual men. Isn’t it strange, in this case it is better to say “homosexual” instead of “gay”, because if you say “gay” and are a considerably “straight” woman, in that case you take the risk to be called raunchy and voyeuristic. If you do that, that is a great move too, because obviously your interest in entirely intellectual AND you in the most innocent way will provide men who are keen on being considered hetero sexual with an intimate opportunity to look at photographs of other men without risking to be lodged in the wrong category.
Also in this case it is up to you if you prefer shooting in black&white or in colour, but if you use colour you better work outside in the dark with natural light or indoors with whatever lamplight is available and use long exposure times so you get a ton of motion blurr, avoid flash or any additional light.
You did well, excellent in fact and you will be rewarded as being considered a brave, risk-taking artist and possibly achieve world fame. Excellent! At the same time you kept your virginal innocence in the eye of the public, my dear, you truly are genius, possibly without even realizing it, because you simply took pictures of whatever came to mind or whoever were your friends at the time.

Josiane Keller “ChoCho’s butt 8” (2016)

Josiane Keller “ChoCho on the sofa” (2016)

Josiane Keller “ChoCho’s right hand, leg and foot” (2016)

Josiane Keller “ChoCho on the sofa looking at me” (2016)

F; If now you are a woman and you take a picture or a series of pictures of other women, nude (pictures of women without clothes on are pretty much always “nude” there are no “naked” women on two dimensional representation, because the word “nude” sounds like something sexy as opposed to the word “naked”, which has to do with the motion your tongue makes saying either word (if you doubt me in that simply repeat after me: “NUDE”, and now: “NAKED”. See what I mean?) So, if you are a woman and take pictures of other nude women then you are: a feminist!
There are two age groups feminist photographers, which are being treated exactly opposite, and if you are a woman photographer listen up, so you are prepared and can make informed choices:

a; If you are young, or look young, and are a being labelled a feminist you will have a tiny group of fans who think you are REALLY BRAVE, but the rest of your audience will put you anywhere in between or on either end of a range between “difficult to work with” and “offensive”, in the worst case: “unreasonable”.
(If you happen to live in a real chauvinist area you will only be called “crazy”, but if that’s where you live you anyways should not try making art but off in the kitchen with you and make some pasta for dinner, and presto!)
However, in terms of style: you can use either crisp focus and front face view or blurr, which represents you were looking a long time at something whilst it was moving or you were moving yourself, which if the something is a nude woman is considered very exciting for everyone else, even if in reality you just lost your balance. Imagination is everything!

Josiane Keller “Molly taking a shower 4” * (2016)

Josiane Keller “Molly taking a shower 7” * (2016)

Josiane Keller “Molly taking a shower 42” * (2016)

b; But if you are no longer considered sexually attractive, (if you are female this meaning you is being judged by visual assessment and even your bank account won’t save you there), really good would be if you have a ton of wrinkles and are a bit hunched over from old age osteoporosis, that is GREAT! Because then you will immediately be the coolest thing around the block and then suddenly every guy who meets you will get shiny eyes and make comments either directly to you or to his buddies that in your days you must have been soooooooo amazing (he means sexy!), which will be real odd if in fact in your days the love of your life ditched you for a show-off and that made you feel like the grayest mouse on the block. (This probably happened, because otherwise you had never dove into your art throughout all those years, but raised four children instead.)
Don’t waste your precious time questioning the logic of life, get on with your work.

Do this using black&white and work from a studio with very crisp focus and classical Western style composition, meaning everything has to be centered smack in the middle of your image if you include a face, but if you skip faces and only do body parts or torsos work with diagonal lines and very balanced off-center-composition. If you are REAL old like you were very young in the 70’s it’s OK to use grainy film or soft filter, because you are from the time when Hamilton was big and hip, you possibly even modeled for him.

If you can make it as a female photographer past your visually attractive age and are still hanging in there stubbornly taking pictures, some of them even of nude women, you have won, so if you think it’s worth the struggle hang in there.
(I applaud you and will cheer you on, please write in your first real successful photo-book “I could have never done it without her support.”)

Josiane Keller “Molly taking a shower 34” * (2016)

Josiane Keller “Molly taking a shower 48” * (2016)

Josiane Keller “breast” (2014)

* If you only seemingly took pictures of a nude woman, and in reality it is not a woman at all, but a transsexual, then you really fooled everyone! (BRAVO!)

P.S.: Oh, one more thing: if you are finally that old shriveled up lady photographer, don’t mess it up your hard earned and now truly excellent winning hand by accidentally taking photographs of nude men, you would throw everything away you have suffered so long for and be considered a gross old leech, stick to attractive nude ladies half or a third of your age.

Josiane Keller “da Juchitzer” (2016)

Also avoid taking pictures of old women same age group as yourself, because then once more you have created a self-portrait (no matter what you thought you were doing or if someone possibly commissioned you), you will remind your audience of the fact that all life comes to an end, which is highly depressing and nobody wants to hear or see that.

Josiane Keller “Eve 2” (2014)

Good luck, friends!