artandsciencejournal:

Photo Friday with Erica Simone’s Nue York

Erica Simone states that she is not an exhibitionist. Through these public, nude self-portraits, she questions how we present ourselves to the world: namely, what would happen if we didn’t have fashion to offer society a desired impression of ourselves? While she acknowledges that fashion is a means for self-expression, Simone also sees its potential to segregate groups and denote social status.

Simone, who is also a fashion photographer, realizes that the way we dress can inspire particular responses from others, and her work ponders at what point we become too involved in the way we appear.

After a brush with the law for appearing naked for this project, Simone also questions why society insists on us appearing in anything other than our natural state: “Why can we be arrested for being naked in the street, when as human beings, we are born naked? Is nudity inherently sexual or is nudity just a part of being human? Why does society typically equate nudity to sex?”

You can find the rest of the collection here.

- Rudayna Bahubeshi