MEET JAMES FALCIANO

our featured queer artist of the month

by Nathaniel

a unicorn queer nudie in love with our naked community
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At GO NAQED we believe in you and the rainbow of human experience and all the shades of Queer. We're featuring your stories, your art, your experiences. FCGN will feature nude art by Queer artists from around the world.

James Falciano is our first profile in Queer Art with many more to come! 

Read how nudity, Queer community, and friends have shaped their life and their art. 

James' art for GO NAQED's event FCGN at Rockbar NYC

What are your pronouns? How do you identify? 
I identify as a non-binary Queer. My pronouns are They/Them 

If you had to put your art in box what would the label on that box say? 
"Joyful Faggotry"

Do you get naqed with friends? why or why not? 
Not until recently really, I guess mainly because of lingering body image issues. To be honest places like the beach were a dread for me most of my life, but last summer a few close friends took me to my first nude beach and it was gloriously liberating! It felt wonderful to just hang out together in nature fully nude in a platonic, non sexual, non exploitative way.  Swimming nude in the ocean is a beautiful feeling.  I did a nude photoshoot with one of those friends not long after which was also fun and liberating, so yes hanging naked with friends is something I'd like to do more of!

James at home

What body issues have you experienced and how has nudity helped you address that? 
Oof, I could write a book about this topic. I have body image issues that stretch back to childhood, when I was teased for being the "chubby kid" in grade school. It led to what I now know can be identified as a severe eating disorder. The residue of this disordered eating followed me for much of my life, as I was always fluctuating with weight. Entering the gay scene in my late teens and early 20s led my obsession with being thin to a fixation with achieving the "perfect" chiseled Adonis body in order to be more desirable to men. 

This led me to working out nearly 6 days a week, sometimes for up to 2 hours at a time, pushing myself even on days when my body wasn't feeling up to it. I took all kinds of supplements, landing myself in the hospital with kidney issues for taking too much creatine. I also tried all kinds of intensive, restrictive diets. When the pandemic hit and gyms were closed, it forced me to sit with my body image issues and finally start to acknowledge them. Since I was home alone a lot during this period, I challenged myself to sit fully naked in front of the mirror and start accepting and loving my body. I'm at a much better place with this now, and lately have taken to staging sensual photoshoots of my naked body, finally apprecitaing it in a way I never had previously. So yes, spending time appreciating my own nude human form has been hugely helpful with working through lingering body image issues and the residual pain from all of that. 
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Why is the queer body so important for your art? 
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It is important for me on a personal level but also on a communal level to celebrate the queer body in my work. Because the queer body has been so historically marginalized, with shame placed onto us and violence enacted against us, it means a lot to me to be able to use my work to counter all of that and celebrate the resilience, beauty, sexuality and joy of the queer body. Joy is a big thing for me in my work, I want to see queer bodies filled with radical joy, unapologetic sensuality and confidence, relaxed and at ease within themsleves and with their lovers, friends and community. 

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What about the queer body inspires you? 
The resilience of the queer body inspires me, how in the face of a world that seeks to erase us the queer body finds ways to connect with one another, to express sexuality with one another, to touch, to hold, to embrace, to commune...there is just so much beauty and softness and strength in the queer body. 

If you could GO NAQED anywhere in the world where would it be and why? 
I'd love a big queer naked excursion to the woods somewhere. I've always been really inspired by and in touch with nature, particularly trees...it would be lovely to have a nude picnic in some summery forest with a bunch of friends. 

When did you first discover the power of the nude queer body and what was most empowering about that? 
I think when I entered the queer community more, and saw others expressing their sexuality more openly, and wearing more revealing clothing and confidently showing their bodies it sparked something in me...sort of like giving me the permission to explore my own sexuality more confidently, and to embrace my own body more, and to express confidence in my body beyond just the sexual parts of it but just the full spectrum of having a human form. It's empowering to reclaim yourself and your body from all the outside noise of society...the limited beauty image standards, all the shame around the nude form, it's just so empowering to realize we have agency to start separating ourselves from all of that and accept and embrace our bodies as beautiful exactly as they are. ​

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Follow James' socials for more art
IG: @jamesfalciano     TWITTER: @​jamesfalciano