Posing Nude & Possible Priapism

[Horny Hefty]

Nowhere to hide
Male nude models have a special problem female models don't: What to
do if they get a woody?
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By Pegi Taylor
Nov. 29, 2000 | As a curious female and an art model, whenever the
opportunity arises, I ask male models if they've ever had an erection
while posing. Most have at least one story to tell -- though usually
not about themselves.
One of the most knowledgeable people I ever talked to about the
subject was Robert Speller. Speller probably hires more models than
anyone else in New York as modeling coordinator at the New School for
Social Research and Parsons School of Design. He started modeling in
the 1960s and has seen it all: a father and son who modeled together;
a couple who would pose as Adam and Eve with a live snake. In the late
1970s he set up modeling engagements for Madonna.
I asked Speller what he thought about male models having erections and
he replied, "Well, men are vulnerable to the air. All male genitals
change shape. There are rustlings in all of us, you know."
Once, Speller received a complaint that a model had ejaculated during
a pose. Speller considered the model one of his best and called him to
ask him what had happened. The fellow explained he'd been reclining
with a spotlight shining right on his crotch. He continued, "Let's
just say I might have been glistening."
Art schools are always looking for new models, and I hope my stories
won't discourage any man from deciding to join the profession. Just a
few weeks ago, I asked some artists, at the end of an open drawing
session, who have been coming weekly for years and years if any of
them had ever witnessed a woody. None of them had.
We models exhibit and expose ourselves when we pose, and our sexuality
is part of who we are, but we don't intentionally aim to stimulate
ourselves or the artists. Any male model who enters a studio wanting
to wave his poker around should leave. As Jerry, one of my favorite
Milwaukee models, put it, "I don't find modeling erotic. I have to be
in intimate contact with my wife for that. People don't believe me,
but I mostly forget I'm nude when I model." He's worked in the
profession for more than 20 years, and his penis has never acted up on
him.
Most male models have a strategy, like solving multiplication
problems, for preventing any rustlings. "I immediately think about two
football teams clashing," says a New York model. "When I experience
the pain of envisioning the hike and three or four 6-foot-3-inch,
275-pound guys crashing into each other, I can guarantee I will lose
my erection."
Hugh Kilmer has led workshops to train models and wrote a manual for
beginners. He heard some models claim that masturbating shortly before
posing could act as an erection deterrent. Kilmer doubts the
effectiveness of this method and coaches male models against trying it
because, "It contradicts the revelation of self which, at least
symbolically, is the essence of modeling as an art."
Rods do get rigid, and not all models find this revelation of the self
overly comfortable. Pete became stiff in a Milwaukee studio and
confessed, "I felt more naked than I've ever felt." It occurred in a
small class with only four students, and no one said anything.
No hard and fast rules exist about how to handle this embarrassing
situation. From what I've gathered, in general people do their best to
ignore a boner. In a series of comments about nude modeling at
About.com, a graduate student remembered "the sound of 20 erasers
rubbing against paper [recording] the change in anatomy," as the only
discernible reaction after a model had a hard-on during a pose.
Instead of obvious sexual responses, female models contend with the
monthly hassle of tucking in the strings of tampons. I've never heard
a female model sweat about having erect nipples, though they would be
clearly visible to artists. A couple of women have mentioned to me
fantasizing about sex to avoid falling asleep while holding a long
pose and getting really moist. In one instance, fluid started to run
down a woman's leg.
Viewing all sorts of all-too-human conditions comes with the territory
for artists who regularly draw the figure. An art student told me
about a model who hopped up onto the platform with a distinctly
distracting "chunk of toilet paper in her butt." The student
discreetly asked her instructor, "So, do I draw it or what?"
Inexperienced students may publicly humiliate models whose images
perplex them. "The model has such a hairy bottom it's hard to draw," a
young woman blurted out to an instructor. The model managed to hold
his tongue as well as his pose.
Sometimes, instructors hire multiple models. When male and female
models work together, there's nothing a priori sexual about it. I look
forward to modeling with men, but I'm not thinking about them as men
really. What makes it fun is arranging our bodies in relationship to
one another. I miss Michael, a Milwaukee dancer, elementary school
teacher and part-time model, who would choreograph all our positions.
This would include touching, like me resting a hand on his shoulder.
I swear, even though he was a good-looking guy, I never got turned on.
We were both too busy. When a pose ends, artists expect you to
immediately assume the next one, and during the pose you are looking
toward the artists so they can see your face, and models put clothes
on at breaks. For all the times I've modeled with another man, I've
never had a chance to check out the guy's equipment for more than a
minute. If I want to scrutinize a model's apparatus, I bring pencils
and paper to a session and draw instead of modeling.
Instructors, on occasion, get a dynamic going in the studio that they
may not perceive of as sexual, but that could easily become erotic for
the model. During an anatomy class an instructor's hand inched closer
and closer toward Speller's penis. "Am I making you nervous?" the
teacher whispered. Speller whispered back, "Right now, no, but lower,
perhaps." Speller refused when a student asked him to move his hands
down the body of a female model. "Some artists forget models are human
beings," he sniffed with disdain.
A Milwaukee model I interviewed was posing with another male and two
female models in the 1980s when the other man stiffened. He put a
piece of paper over his erection, but "a half-hour later the newspaper
was still wiggling." The model supposedly left town out of
embarrassment.
Kilmer gave me an example of how he dealt with possible arousal before
one of his training sessions. The boyfriend of a woman planning to
participate in a workshop called Kilmer to see if he could attend as
well. When Kilmer welcomed him to come, the boyfriend confided he was
anxious he might get an erection. Kilmer wrote him, "Erections are not
only possible for someone in your situation: They are likely. They are
also, however ... thoroughly appropriate." A model has no need to
control himself because Kilmer values commitment over control. The
model commits to "what it means for us to be human: human both as
strength, and as weakness."
An instructor who used to teach at the University of Wisconsin at
Milwaukee would purposely set up sexually charged poses. Pete told me
about modeling for a class of hers when, during a break, some students
started joking about self-portraits of expressionist artist Egon
Schiele masturbating. The students pestered Pete to masturbate for the
next drawing. The instructor turned the teasing into a request, and
Pete decided, "OK, I'll do it for artistic purposes." Before he
started stroking himself, he worried he might not be able to get hard
with so many eyes on him. After he did, and kept his hand around his
woody, he worried about the social system. If the art school
administration found out what he'd done, would it blacklist him?
The school never reprimanded him and he received compliments from the
teacher, who said, "A great academic drawing can be boring. But a
drawing with emotional energy, even if the proportions are off, can
still be a really nice drawing." Kilmer would agree. "Sex needs to be
accepted and incorporated into art," he wrote in an unpublished essay,
"with a careful, humble mixture of humor, prudence and delight."
In the most recent public stiff anecdote I heard, a group of female
artists certainly found a model's chubby acceptable. The story started
with a question: "Mom, what if I get an erection?" This isn't
something most sons ask their mothers, but in this case, perfectly
understandable. In August, Brian, 18, contemplated art modeling for
the first time in a classroom with strangers. His mother, Kathy, a
naturist who has modeled nude in artists' studios for more than 20
years, had encouraged her son to try posing for a class run by a
family friend.
According to Kathy the teacher assured Brian, "If it happens, it's no
big deal." The teacher further assuaged Brian's fears by explaining,
"Occasionally a male model does become aroused during class, but the
erection usually quickly subsides and no one is offended." Brian
agreed to try.
So what happened to young Brian, who modeled for the first time in
September? Not five minutes went by before he got a boner. It was an
adult-education class, and Kathy attended. "I could see that he was
trying very hard not to, but the more he tried the harder it got," she
observed. The women all continued sketching; the sole male student was
outraged. He stopped drawing and demanded Brian step down. The teacher
decided to put the situation to a vote. All the women's hands shot up
to have Brian stay.
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About the writer
Pegi Taylor is a writer, educator and art model in Milwaukee.