Depictions of nudity

Depictions of nudity include visual representations of nudity through the history, in all the disciplines, including the arts and sciences. Nudity is restricted in most societies, but some depiction of nudity may serve a recognized social function. Clothing also serves as a significant part of interpersonal communication, and the lack of clothing needs to have a social context. In Western societies, the three contexts that are easily recognized by a majority of individuals are art, pornography, and information or science. Any image not easily fitting into one of these categories may be misinterpreted, leading to disputes.

Nudity in art - painting, sculpture and more recently photography - has generally reflected social standards of the time in aesthetics and modesty/morality. At all times in human history, the human body has been one of the principal subjects for artists. It has been represented in paintings and statues since prehistory. Both male and female nude depictions were common in antiquity, especially in ancient Greece. Depictions of the naked body have often been used in symbolic ways, as an extended metaphor for complex and multifaceted concepts. The Roman goddess Venus, whose functions encompassed love, beauty, sex, fertility and prosperity, was central to many religious festivals in ancient Rome, and was venerated under numerous cult titles. The Romans adapted the myths and iconography of her Greek counterpart, Aphrodite, in their art and literature.

In the later classical tradition of the West, Venus was one of the most widely depicted deities of Greco-Roman mythology as the embodiment of love and sexuality. In ancient Rome, she embodied love, beauty, enticement, seduction, and persuasive female charm among the community of immortal gods; in Latin orthography, her name is indistinguishable from the noun venus ("sexual love" and "sexual desire"), from which it derives.

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