An Attempt to Get Laid
Terry Donovan
At 16 I told my best friend that when I grew up I was going to be a photographer for Playboy, Penthouse, Hustler or any of the other assorted skin mags stashed away in granny’s utility room. My reason was simple. At the end of every shoot, the supple, perfectly proportioned, pouty-lipped vixen would look at me with misty eyes, her lower lip trembling, and with a slight quiver in her voice say, "Fuck me you beautiful stud, you!" Had I known I’d have a better chance of getting laid as a rock musician my life may have been considerably different.
Yet, photographing nudes was a career option that seemed to have a toe dipped in reality for two reasons. One, I had had a camera in hand as early as four. And two, sometime around the time Marilyn Monroe was found dead of an accidental overdose/suicide/murder/alien abduction, I had found the issue of Playboy containing her centerfold hidden under my dad’s gun closet. It was the genesis of a lifelong obsession with nudes.
Even though I shot a wide range of subjects in my youth, from mundane family gatherings to landscapes to abstract images, I was 23 before I was able to realize my teen dream of a photo session meant to produce "artistic" nude images. That year I did three shoots.
I didn’t do the fourth until 1997, when I was 41. That shoot was done as a favor for a friend. In reality, I was the one being granted a favor because it renewed my interest in nude photography and drove me to pursue it further, a pursuit that made my mundane job as a computer programmer infinitely more tolerable.
I often struggle with whether my work is porn or art since the driving force behind the shoots stems from a voyeuristic pleasure at seeing people naked or having sex. Don’t get me wrong, I see nothing wrong with doing porn. It’s a much more noble calling than, say, being an oil executive or a congressman.
The main reason I struggle with the porn/art question is because I continually fail in my own attempts to define art. I convinced myself that all artists work from a well-defined aesthetic or did their shoots with unifying lofty concepts in mind. I, on the other hand, tend to shoot nude photos like Dick Cheney shoots quail. I load up with ideas and let the buckshot fly as soon as someone moves, or takes their clothes off, as the case may be.
From the beginning it was important to inject a creative aspect into the shoots. That was more to create a sense of play in the shoots than it was to create art. The gradual accrual of images that could conceivably constitute an artistic series is usually unintentional. For example, I’m intrigued by the fact that if a nude is wearing a mask, I find myself more likely to keep looking at the mask than the model’s body, or that a four-foot rubber alien can look like it’s emotionally involved with the model, so I will often do shots containing those elements. The major exception to the accidental series may be my Model vs. Photographer shots. Bored, with no models available, I planned the initial dozen or so shots as a tongue-in-cheek series. Like a fair portion of my work, the emphasis was on trying to be humorous–in this case with myself as the butt of a joke.
I’ve also discovered that my relationship with a model ultimately has a great deal to do with the success of my work. A model with whom I enjoy working provides inspiration for me to keep striving to improve and to make the shoots enjoyable enough that they’ll want to continue getting naked for me.
I discovered that too much praise of my work almost killed my creativity. Like a puppy repeating tricks hoping for another Scooby snack, I found myself trying to copy the shots that had generated the praise long after I had tired of the subject.
Fortunately, I’ve grown out of trying to design my shoot to please an audience. Instead, I’m addicted to the damn Scooby snacks.
