About this artwork
This photograph was probably taken in Arbus’s subject’s bedroom, but the curtains framing the shot make it appear like a theatre set and the man stands centre stage as he were ready to begin his performance. As he is a ‘naked man being a woman’, he is indeed playing a role. He stands self-consciously yet provocatively, his hip pushed forward in a showgirl’s pose, the lines of his body highlighted by Arbus’s flash. Some writers have noticed that his feet are placed like Venus in Botticelli’s painting The Birth of Venus (about 1482–86) in which the goddess emerges from the sea as a woman, covering her nakedness with her long hair. Standing in front of Arbus’s camera, his face caked in make-up and his expression distant, the man here is also emerging as a woman, but he makes no attempt to hide his naked body from scrutiny.
Updated before 2020
-
artist:Diane Arbus (1923 - 1971) American
-
title:Naked man being a woman, N.Y.C. 1968
-
date created:1968; printed after 1971
-
materials:Gelatin silver print on paper
-
measurements:36.20 x 36.80 cm (framed: 81/80 x 61.90 x 2.00 cm)
-
object type:
-
credit line:ARTIST ROOMS National Galleries of Scotland and Tate. Acquired jointly through The d'Offay Donation with assistance from the National Heritage Memorial Fund and Art Fund, 2008
-
accession number:AR00547
-
gallery:
Diane Arbus
Diane Arbus
Diane Arbus is one of the most influential photographers of the twentieth century. Born in New York City, she was working as a fashion photographer before she began to pursue an artistic career. Arbus made portraits of people from across society, but is best known for her powerful images of people...