Nudism and Naturism

Hi everyone! I haven’t done much interaction on here due to mostly using this blog as a storage for stories and images I find interesting or reveal something about nudism to share with my close friends... I have not been to a large amount of organised nudist events lately but I thought I would share an experience or 2 on here now :) So in the past year I have been to two nude art tours in Sydney and both have been some of the most uplifting and Beautiful things I have ever done. The most recent was a dance performance meant to interpret the art which features works of nudity, feminism and nature. The day started by meeting some other nudists I had met online, I am still disappointed that none of my Uni friends want to give nudism a go but I am glad to to be meeting other people too. We went inside to realise that it was not as small group as I first imagined, 50 to 60 people were all standing around drinking wine and talking and the backdrop of the art gallery was extremely fancy I felt like I should have a suit rather than my Birthday suit! this event shocked me because in contrast to nude beaches which are probably 1/3 female and 2/3 older people this event was the most even spread of people I could have imagined; old, young, male, female, all sexualities, and all races, all nervous (except us nudists) from what followed I could tell many where first timers and many where there for the art and for the thrill. after a while a lady who seemed to be in charge spoke and told us to go downstairs where we would disrobe and go in and as we all went down noone was willing to be the first to strip, my little group was about to start and then the man who had organised the event stood up and told us about the art and the performance and told us to strip down, we were first out of the gate and after some mumbles and giggles everyone followed suit. we walked down the corridor, the girls in front jiggling and prancing all the way like they were free of all shyness. as we walked in we found a nude statue like Michelangelo's “david” and crouching next to it was a nude man curled in a ball, curious to see if there was more performers we wandered through the entire exhibit immediately, and found a woman planking on a bench and then the music started the performers slowly rose and began to move along finding more and more creative ways to imitate the art with their bodies, the more abstract the better. the crowd slowly began to become more organised with people crouching and sitting to get better views. as the music changed more and more performers appeared either from the crowd or the other rooms and they began to do different dances based on the music more aggressive or more soothing, and also began to interact together. I’ll now detail some of the memorable moments from the performance and artworks... first there was a interesting performance where 2 male and a female performer would stand shoulder to shoulder with the one in the centre behaving like a puppet, like you would as a kid, acting as though none of your limbs or head could hold their weight, blank expressions all round. the other two performers would then manipulate and contort their bodies much to the amusement of the crowd including blowing raspberries (i’m not sure if that is an Australian term but it means like making kissing lips on a part of the body like your arm and blowing as if you wanted to make bubbles) and also pinching the belly fat and squishing butts and breasts to make faces, and interlocking limbs in puzzling ways. It was had not to laugh but it was cool to see the performers really explore their bodies and keep serious the whole time... the next act was 2 female performers showing competitiveness between girls for attention. they both stood on a platform and would copy each others movements doing things like covering their vagina’s in increasingly rapid movements, pushing their breasts to make them look bigger and putting their arms in the air as if to say “look at me, look at me” at one point one girl would bend over to show their bum to the crowd and then the other would follow and then they bent lower and I think one of them went one more time than planned because the other refused to go lower and began genuinely loosing it laughing at the face the first lady was pulling as if to say “beat that” and the crowd laughed and cheered the other on for her victory. finally the performance of the night involved all the performers converging on the middle of the gallery backed against a large scene of nude people dancing around a fire and they began to waltz together and then as the crowd grew and we gave them space they then began to walk toward us and grab the hands of random people and began to dance with them too before sitting them behind the performance without fail each person had a giant embarrassed grin on their face to be in front of everyone but they did it anyway. one by one male female didn’t matter we all danced in the nude  and were seated by the performers until we formed all full circle and clapped each other on our bravery. It was a truly special moment to see old and young, art critic and student, lawyer and construction worker, all smiling and appreciating each other for all the flaws and imperfections we all thought we looked amazing with our clothes off! Now as for the works themselves some that really stood out to me, and you will have to excuse my ignorance of the artists, was a giant room sized sculpture of a naked man. It wasn't marble or stone but it was skin coloured with real looking hair. it fascinated me because He had the exact same patterns of body hair I do and It really made me feel better about my hair to see that someone else had seen it and felt it was worth making giant... another was a small model of a bunch of vaginas with two balls above/below each, It really made me think about genders and how we make such big deals about our tiny differences instead of the huge amount we have in common... lastly was a political comic that had a statistic that even though 60% of nudity related pieces are painted by men more than 85% of the works depict females and asks the question “do girls have to be nude to get into the museum”. It really demonstrated that historically females where very much objectified and there is still a long way to go to fix this inequality and stigma.... so finally the music stopped and we walked toward the exit toward our clothes, the final thing that I loved to see was how slow and reluctant everyone was to get dressed  people would put on their shirts and walk around for a while pant less and vice versa and start chatting half naked. it was the slowest I’ve ever seen any group get changed, like normally in a shower at a pool or gym people would only be nude for a second and make ridiculous strides to cover up while they change. It was truly a life changing experience.