Performers - Part 82

 The Beatles

The Beatles were John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr.  Of the four, John was the most willing to be photographed nude.  Above, he posed with his girlfriend Yoko Ono for the cover of the November 23, 1968 issue of Rolling Stone magazine.

Years later, he and Yoko graced the cover of Rolling Stone again on the January 22, 1981 issue.

In 1968, John and Yoko put out the album Two Virgins, with this full-frontal photo on the cover.

How could they sell the album with that naked cover?  In stores, the album was covered with brown paper with a cutout for John and Yoko's faces and the album name Two Virgins.

John was even photographed sporting an erection in this photo with Yoko.

What about the other Beatles?  I don't know if this nude photo of Paul McCartney is real or fake.

But this photo of Paul in the bathtub, taken by his wife, is real, including a peekaboo view.

There are apparently no unfaked nude photos of George or Ringo.  We end with this 1968 pop art poster of all four Beatles by Richard Bernstein.  It's art, not a photo, and it shows them all circumcised.  In actual fact, Paul was circumcised, but John certainly wasn't.  I don't know about George and Ringo.  Oh, well.

Photographers - Part 82

Louis Igout

Louis Jean-Baptiste Igout (1837-1881) was a French photographer when photography was still new.  He also founded his own publishing house, specializing in producing high-quality photographic prints.  His company became known for innovative printing techniques that allowed for greater detail and clarity.

Above is plate 38 from his book Album d'Etudes - Poses (Album of Studies - Poses),  which contained plates of photos of nude men, women and children.  We're concentrating on the men.

For more clarity online, I have cropped the images from the book and brightened them slightly.  Above is plate 38 again.  Click on any of these images for a larger version.

I came across this image online, labeled "Model for painting with rock".  It is actually not the model for a painting. It's the second image from plate 38 above.

Here are a few more plates from the book.  Above, plate 33.

Plate 37 features two models with some wrestling or fighting poses.

We end with another model on plate 41.

Louis Igout died in 1881 at the age of 44.  I do not know the cause of his death.

The blog Vintage Muscle Men has featured many photos by Igout - go to the blog and click on Igout on the list at right to see them.

Calendars - Part 83

Naked Rugby Players

The Naked Rugby Players calendar is a calendar put out by a group of British rugby teams. The 2019 calendar featured 71 naked players from six teams.  Photographer Monty McKinnen got to photograph all six teams naked.  On the cover: the Liverpool Tritons.

Like most of these British nude calendars, it raises money for charity: in this case, Balls to Cancer, an organization fighting testicular cancer.

Above, the Sheffield Vulcans rugby team.

The Brighton & Hove Sea Serpents.

The Bristol Bisons.

The Glasgow Alphas.

The Northampton Outlaws.

We end with the Liverpool Tritons bellying up to the bar.

Protests - Part 82

Portland Emergency World Naked Bike Ride

Normally, World Naked Bike Rides (WNBRs) are held in various cities to remind drivers to drive safely around bicycles and to encourage people to ride bikes instead of driving cars.

But organizers in Portland, Oregon, called for an "emergency" WNBR on October 12, 2025 to protest two things: (1) Donald Trump's decision to send the National Guard to Portland (note the rider's message above "Fuck Don-Old") ...

and (2) the activities of ICE in Portland (see another rider's message above).

The forecast called for rain, so some riders came prepared.

And the ride began.

Like other WNBRs, not everyone rode a bike, and not everyone was naked (it's "as bare as you dare").  These two guys ran the course with another anti-ICE message.

Here's a frontal view of the same two guys.

And here's a rear view, as it started to rain.

More protesters ("Fuck ICE").

The ride led to ICE headquarters in Portland.

We end with a couple of riders who are wearing face masks like ICE.  I read speculation based on pictures like this that ICE had infiltrated the WNBR.  Believe me, these guys are mocking ICE.  ICE agents would not appear naked in public.

In the end, the National Guard was not sent to Portland.  It was opposed as a totally unnecessary political stunt by the Mayor, the Governor, and both Senators from Oregon.  A U.S. District Judge barred the Trump administration from deploying the National Guard to Portland, and after the Supreme Court declined to overturn a similar judge's ban in Chicago, Trump announced the removal of federal troops from numerous cities, including Portland.  So the National Guard was not sent there.

Ivy League Posture Photos - Part 61

Ivy League Posture Photos

Yale started taking nude photos of incoming freshmen in 1919 as part of a program to detect and correct posture problems.  The Yale photos have erroneously been associated with William Sheldon, a psychologist at Harvard and author of Nazi-like eugenic theories who used Harvard nude posture photos to illustrate his theory of somatypes.  The Yale program predates Sheldon, and, as far as I can tell, the Yale photos were never connected to Sheldon's work.

Here are posture photos of ten more Yale students that I had the opportunity to acquire.

This is Yale freshman Charles H. King, Jr. on October 16, 1953.

In 1952, Yale installed an apparatus using mirrors to photograph the front, rear, side and top view.

This is Yale freshman Edward Hahn Cook on October 12, 1953.

Note the strange pins stuck to each student's back and chest.

This is Yale freshman E. B. on March 14, 1949.

The pins were stuck on at specific points for later posture analysis.

This is Yale freshman Jean Francis Ross on October 21, 1949.

Photos taken before 1952 show only a side view.

This is Yale freshman Robert Armstrong Antonovich on October 17, 1949.

Supposedly, by examining the angles formed by connecting the points where the pins touched the body, certain posture problems could be detected.

This is Yale freshman Thomas Freeman Graves on January 20, 1949.

If posture problems were detected, the student had to attend remedial posture sessions, and a second posture photo was taken.

This is Yale freshman George Ervin Lamb on January 12, 1951.

The photography and analysis of the photos was conducted by the staff of Yale's Payne Whitney Gymnasium.

This is Yale freshman James Pinckney Harrison on March 6, 1951.

Nobody outside the gymnasium staff saw the photos.

This is Yale freshman Richard Hyde Hiers on February 1, 1951.

The photos were not published for other students to see.

This is Yale freshman Robert Dunn Haws on February 1, 1951.

The posture photo program was discontinued in the 1960s, and later, most of the photos were burned.  However, some of the photos escaped burning, including the photos that I have been showing in this series.

*          *          *

Note: some of my followers consider these photos an invasion of privacy for the students.  To protect the privacy of the students, I redact the names of students who may still be alive.  I only publish the names of students who have died.  Legally, the right to privacy does not extend beyond death, i.e. it does not extend to spouses and relatives of the deceased person.

I consider these photos to be a historical record of the time.  Almost all of the Ivy League posture photos were burned when their existence became widely known.  In my opinion, that was akin to book-burning of books that someone claimed were obscene.  These photos are not obscene.  They should be celebrated, not hidden away.

Bodybuilders - Part 34

Alberto Bistocchi 

Alberto Bistocchi is an Italian bodybuilder, currently about 63 years old.  He continued to enter bodybuilding competitions at least into his fifties, proving that not only the young can have fit bodies.  Above, Alberto posing in the IFBB Pro Master Mr. Olympia contest in 2012.

Alberto has also posed with less clothing.

Here he poses sideways.  What's that sticking up?

Well, he knows how to take care of that.

Ads - Part 80

 Shape-It Weight Loss Patch

This is a commercial for a weight loss patch from the German company Shape-It.  What the connection is between the naked young man and a weight loss patch is not explained.  I think the reason for including him in the ad was to attract women, the target audience for the product.

The video was posted online in 2014, so the commercial aired in or before that year.

Weight loss patches are adhesive patches that are stuck on the skin and transfer medical ingredients through the skin.  In the U.S., no weight loss patches have been approved by the FDA.  There is a lack of evidence that they work, and some of their ingredients may cause side effects like headaches or rashes.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the Shape-It company seems to have gone out of business – their website no longer exists.  But they gave us a nice commercial to look at.