Billy Monday used to spend hours -- sometimes whole days -- arranging objects for a still life photo. Shooting nude models outdoors creates an entirely different experience."It's totally dynamic," he said. "Ideas are being exchanged. It's much more challenging."
The Frederick -based artist began using models in the studio, as well as outdoor environments, about five years ago, and his recent piece, "The View From Loudon Heights," was selected for the Juror's Choice Award at the Cumberland Valley Photographic Salon. The piece shows a female nude, her long, orangish hair hanging down to her thighs. She's standing on a mountaintop, facing a sunrise near Harpers Ferry, above the Shenandoah River, while thick fog rolls between the hills and bridges.
"I'm always happy when these shows accept nudes," Monday said. (Some photographers don't even bother to submit nude photos because they assume they won't be selected.)
Monday, 48, has been a commercial photographer all his life, his livelihood coming primarily from weddings and bar mitzvahs.
He uses some digital manipulation for fun, but his work tends to be realistic, if whimsical.
"It's a classic subject, but it's scary when you first do it, like, oh -- she's nude. You have to break through that distraction."
He photographed his first nude in the studio but quickly migrated outside thereafter. He's always gravitated toward natural landscapes in his work. His images are shot at waterfalls, fields, woods and farmland in the area as well as other parts of the country. A shot in Utah shows a girl jumping above a sandy desert dune.
"We live in a great spot for this," he said. "This area has driven me to shoot ... waterfalls are kind of my thing."
He had planned to shoot a waterfall series during the summer of 2006 -- when the county happened to go through a horrible drought. "The whole creek was like pouring a two-liter bottle of water down it," he said.
He works through various themes. In another series, he used a mannequin (Claire), sometimes in pieces. His most recent work explores spheres, including hanging lanterns. Last week, he taught a workshop on cave paintings, a method of using light to take pictures inside caves. All of them include nude models.
"What you should focus on is what you're capturing and the mood."
Monday has a way of melding models with their environments, whether it's a tree whose roots stretch far from its base, a woman lying there in them; or a field of power lines, stretching into the horizon, a model backed against its cold metal. Whether it's a dead field covered in snow, or a green summer day next to a waterfall, the model becomes intrinsic to the landscape, complementary or juxtaposed.
"I don't think anything of it anymore, walking around a park with a nude."
He once took photos in a D.C. metro, traveling back and forth between two stations -- with a nude woman.
"The model was, like, high on it," he said, laughing. "If I ever got into an legal trouble, I think my wife would say 'back to the still lifes.'"
He realizes that photographers like himself can get a bad name but also that he's been a professional photographer all his life, and that nudes simply became his niche.
"We're trying to capture a beautiful, free expression," he said, speaking on behalf of similar photographers who take the subject seriously. "I think I'm trying to show the good side of humanity."
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To see the award-winning photo, go to billymonday.com.
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