Nudity's Not Art

Wednesday, April 06, 2005

It's a story I've been following for awhile now, and I was unsure how it would play out after "the plan" was enacted. Looks like not so well.

Boise, Idaho is probably not the most ideal city for strip club owners looking to make the big bucks, considering its ban on full nudity.

But Erotic City owner Chris Teague came up with an ingenious idea: declare Monday night "art night" and allow patrons to observe fully nude women in the name of art. Teague further attempted to legitimize his gimmick by handing out pencils and sketch pads to patrons so they could sketch the girls hoping to satisfy a Boise exception that allows full nudity for "serious artistic" expression only.

City officials were unimpressed, however, and cited Erotic City for violating Boise's nudity rules. A police spokeswoman justified the action by saying the patrons were not focused on the art.

So how can you tell if someone's focused on the art or not? Perhaps I don't really want to know, but it was a good attempt by Mr. Teague nonetheless.