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Dear Friend and Reader,
What’s the story with nudity these days? Pole dancers are wearing tracksuits and vying for the 2012 Olympics, and the Metropolitan Opera in NYC wants less heavy costuming, and more “take it off!”
Last weekend,the WPDF (World Pole Dancing Federation) held its sixth-annual European Championship competition in Amsterdam, where 14 finalists from nine countries competed for the title. Galina Troschenko from Spain came in first, and if you’re wondering why, take a look at the photo below — she’s touching her head with her toes!
Now, for any of you who’ve had to climb up a rope in Phys Ed, you can imagine how difficult pole dancing is: there is no question that these girls are serious gymnasts. And, on top of that, many of them are wearing sky-high heels and thongs while they perform: show me the last floor routine where that was a clothing requirement.
The buzz around the competition this year is all about qualifying as an Olympic sport, and in all likelihood, that’s why the headlines are focused on taking the sex out of pole dancing.
“Everything which we do requires so much strength. You train your legs and your muscles. It has nothing to do with eroticism. You have no time to think of that!” Jeannine Wikering, third place winner of the European championships, told Reuters.
Meanwhile, as I took a sneaky coffee break on Thursday morning, I opened up The Arts section of The New York Times and you know what the headline was? “Take It Off BrГјnnhilde: On Opera and Nudity.”
This month, both the Met’s production of “Salome” and “The Fly” will involve nude scenes for the main characters. (The production of “Salome” is returning after a four-year hiatus, which also included soprano Karita Mattila in the flesh, and not much else.)
I feel like I’ve stepped onto the set of 10 Things I Hate About You, that Heath Ledger/Julia Styles remake of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew. Basically, the uptight older sister (The Metropolitan Opera House) experiences a sexual awakening and learns to live a little, while the out-of-control little sister (pole dancers) finds a nice guy, buttons up her shirt and settles down.
While it seems inevitable that the Opera would join other stage arts (dance, plays) by including nudity, it keeps jarring with me that pole dancing — a sport/artistic medium that is almost solely practiced in strip clubs — is trying to deny its connection to sex. I can’t help but wonder: why do we have to erase all signs of sex before we can take something seriously?