But what we have now is something quite different from all that. The golden Halston jockstraps and the glittering bandeaux worn by the Graham company in the ’80s were a glossy alternative to the hairy-toed naked hippies of downtown dance. In the ’60s we had nudity in performance for egalitarian reasons, in the ’70s we had it as a symbol of sexual liberation, and in the ’80s and ’90s it was political-laden with concerns about gender, disease, oppression, and identity.

Ted Shawn claimed some measure of equal ground with his scantily clad beefcake numbers that entertained a genteel, tea-drinking, largely female audience.īut nudity was still largely offstage. One of Isadora Duncan’s first actions was to toss away her corset. Dancers as strippers, dancers as prostitutes, dancers as chorus girls, dancers as mistresses of the Tsars-the titillating aspects of the form have long been associated with women and have been viewed with suspicion and sometimes scorn by practitioners of high art dance. But what has this new emphasis on the unclothed brought with it? What does it reveal beyond skin, genitals, pores, and flesh? Quite a lot, as it turns out.ĭancing and nudity have a long-standing, if edgy relationship. Full, unenhanced nudity is usually reserved for sex, hygiene, some beaches, some kinds of friendship, and now, experimental dance. These people don’t seem naked but armored. But this kind of nudity is like a form of erotic technology with surgically enlarged body parts designed to lure. It seems to support the existence of the Internet, in fact. Near-nudity pervades our culture, of course, and the strange nudity of the engorged, buffed, plucked, and polished gym body is everywhere to be seen for a small fee. Could I have still watched what they were doing or am I too crass? I’m contemplating all this while watching the latter day Freds and Gingers of experimental dance parade their entire naked selves before me on a regular basis. I now delight in imagining Fred and Ginger performing “Never Gonna Dance,” their brilliant, melancholy dance from Swing Time, naked as jaybirds. I was, however, deliciously unsettled by thoughts of Gene Kelly and Debbie Reynolds slipping out of their playful-chic ’20s outfits on the soundstage of Singin’ in the Rain to indulge in a little soft shoe in the buff, or, even better, a nude rain-drenched solo by Kelly to the title song. In those days my dance idols were Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Donald O’Connor, Debbie Reynolds, Ann Miller, and Eleanor Powell. When I was a teenager in a drab suburb of Boston, little did I think that I’d live among such gloriously uninhibited creatures.

But unlike many dancers today, my vanity and modesty interfere. I wonder wistfully if this had been going on 15 years ago whether I’d have been more likely to join in or might even have received some offers to do so. What’s happening? The movers and shakers of the downtown dance world are now moving and shaking their naked booties on stages all over town. No, I’m talking about an epidemic of naked dance performances where I’m right there in the audience. I’m not crashing dressing rooms after concerts or lurking in the showers at dance or yoga studios. I have been living and working in New York’s downtown dance world for more than 25 years, but it’s only recently that I’ve been confronted with the sight of so many of my peers naked.

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