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Fleur Blüm

~ writer, performer, musician

Fleur Blüm

Tag Archives: Life Models’ Society

Let’s talk about why that isn’t a compliment…

14 Monday Dec 2020

Posted by toearlyretirement in Art, My Journey

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

body image, Feminism, life drawing, Life model, Life Modelling, Life Models' Society

Yesterday I attended an end of year picnic with some people from the Life Models’ Society. A person approached me:

Them: You look like you’ve lost weight.
Me: [laughing] I really haven’t.
Them: Then why do you look like you have?
Me: [awkwardly ignores the comment and goes back to my previous conversation]

Let’s break down why this conversation was fucked up.

Photo by Maksim Goncharenok on Pexels.com

1: Commenting on my weight is never a compliment
Regardless of how well-meaning you are, commenting on my body shape, weight loss, or gain is not a compliment. I am more than the sum of what I weigh, and whether I currently fit into Western ideals of beauty. It also implies there are people unworthy of your compliment/respect/value based on their bodies, which is not cool. All bodies are good bodies.

What can I say instead?
Nothing;
Hello;
You look well;
You seem happy;
I’m pleased to see you;
That outfit is smashing.

2: If I correct you, accept this.
When I said I have not lost weight, and indeed I have put on a fair amount what with the injury and COVID restrictions and lock-down and stress and the like, the person in this conversation argued with me. This could be considered gaslighting, a practice where you habitually deny the reality of another person in order to undermine them. Part of my also wonders if people have a concept of what I look like that is a lot fatter than how I appear in person, given how often I get told ‘you’ve lost weight’ and the fact that I have not, in fact, lost weight.

What can you I instead?
‘What I meant was you look well/happy/great in that outfit’. Or maybe going back to the above idea of not commenting on my body in the first place don’t say anything. If I correct you, don’t ignore that correction, especially when it is about me, my body, or my life. I’m the expert in that field, and you have no right to doubt me.

Women in particular are subjected to appearance based judgement frequently and I, for one, would be happy to see it go in the bin.

This year has been particularly difficult for my relationship with my body. For a period of time it was severely broken, it is now only mildly broken. I have had a lot of intense pain, and still have ongoing mild to moderate pain and restrictions in my mobility.

I don’t consider myself permanently disabled (yet); time will tell whether my ankle injury (and the associated back pain which has become more of an issue now I’m more active) is permanent and to what extent. I have good days and bad days. I limp in the morning and when I get up from a long period of sitting.

In six weeks it will have been a year since the incident. I’m surprised, frustrated, and disheartened by the amount of work still to be done return to full functionality. Then again, I look back at the time when it was too much to walk to the coffee shop (ten minutes away) and back, and I’ve come a long way.

I’m sure I’m not alone in this experience. It’s always uncomfortable when people compliment me for the way my body looks; sometimes when I’m modelling artists will say I have a ‘real/natural’ or ‘womanly’ figure, which makes me uncomfortable not only because I’m being objectified, but because it implies an ‘unreal/unnatural’ or ‘unwomanly’ figure.

I welcome compliments on my creative posing, my stillness, my use of shadow/shape/foreshortening, my theatrics, but whether or not my body is highly consumable is not a compliment. I’m sure I do it too, it’s a cultural norm, but I’m working on it. Maybe we all need to spend some time cultivating new ways to tell people we value them.

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Winning and Procrastination

29 Friday Nov 2019

Posted by toearlyretirement in Art, Writing

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Art competition, Art show, Creativity, Inspiration, Life Models' Society, NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month, volunteer, Writing

NaNo-2019-Winner-Twitter-Header

Yesterday, November 28, 2019 I won NaNoWriMo for the eighth time. I’m proud of myself, but having done it before it doesn’t feel like such a big deal anymore. I’m ready to take a bit of a break from my story, but I have two more days of November to try to get some words down.

I won’t give away too much, but the story is a paranormal thriller with a romance subplot. Once it’s done it should be a stand-alone novel; about 80k words I expect.

I frequently feel I put off starting work on creative projects; on the days I don’t have to go in to my day job, I don’t start my NaNoWriMo words until well into the afternoon. I’m very good at distracting myself by watching Netflix, or shows on the various other streaming platforms (there are so many now!). I try to procrastinate productively, by doing other jobs on my list, but it doesn’t remove the feeling I’m wasting time. Perhaps one day, when I’m a grown up, I won’t do it anymore.

Now NaNoWriMo is done can get back to planning to release a new book early next year, and I have already started writing a show for the Melbourne Fringe Festival next year.

I can’t wind down just yet, I still have an exhibition opening for the Life Models’ Society Inaugural Art Competition on December 17 before I can start slacking off. I hope to see some of you there.

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So I’m project managing an art competition!

15 Saturday Jun 2019

Posted by toearlyretirement in Art, My Journey

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

fundraising, Gasworks Arts Park, Inspiration, life drawing, Life model, Life Modelling, Life Models' Society, NaNoWriMo, Writing

I’m sure you’re all aware that one of my jobs is modelling for art classes and drawing groups. I’m also heavily involved in the running of an organisation called the Life Models’ Society – a collective of models who advocate for better pay and condition for life models.

The LMS has been around for thirty years, as of 2019. We, the LMS Committee, decided as part of the anniversary year we would run an art competition. The idea is to generate more work for our models; the full competition rules are here.

It’s open to anyone in Melbourne, but you have to have made the work this year and feature an LMS model as the subject.

This is a fantastic opportunity to promote art and life modelling in Melbourne. We will be hosting the accompanying exhibition at Gasworks Arts Park in Albert Park in December. It’s probably the biggest event I’ve ever organised – much bigger in scale, budget, etc. than the book launch I hosted earlier in the year.

I’m really relishing the challenge of managing the working group,  and approaching sponsors, judges, artists and models to participate. It’s taking up a fair bit of my non-work time.

I’ve been working on a novel manuscript as well, and I’m now over 52k words into a book I didn’t write as part of NaNoWriMo. After all the input I’ve had from my writing groups over the years, I think this story is one of the most polished and interesting I’ve written and I haven’t even finished the first draft!

I look forward to seeing how the competition all works out, and for the skills I’m developing in the events management arena. I’ll keep you all informed on how this progresses.

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fleurblum@hotmail.com

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