Première Femme

Christie's is planning to auction off a nude portrait of Carla Bruni, the French First Lady. The portrait was taken by photographer Michel Comte during a 1993 photo session.

Bruni is the new wife of French President Sarkozy, and apparently she's ticked that someone is going to try to make some cash from her portrait on the eve of her visit to England.

The Daily Mail reports one of her aides as saying, ""Carla is very angry, not to say deeply upset, that a commercial organization has chosen to release this print at such an important time.

"Her priority is to establish herself on the world stage as a first lady France can be proud of."

Well, I don't know about France, but you can count me in as one of the proud.

Since when are nude portraits shameful? I'm not talking about the grainy, paparazzi beach shots of movie stars. I'm talking about models and artists plying their trade to give us something beautiful, which is what Mrs. Sarkozy is.

She was a gorgeous model and someone took her picture. Big deal. Carpenters don't get grief for houses they built 10 years ago, and models shouldn't take any flack for their past portraits, either.

I love the US and Canada, but our prudishness is ridiculous (even the New York Post would only run the portrait's head and shoulders). In the full portrait, you can see Carla Bruni's breasts. They are human breasts. You can see her face. It's a human face. You can see her feet. They are human feet.

She's a human being. Whether film emulsion or water-based paint, all portraits are attempts at showing us the human form, and it's up to us to decide what we see.

Michelangelo, Titian, Da Vinci, Raphael. To be embarrassed by Bruni's portrait is to be ashamed of the greats. It is worth remembering that Da Vinci and the boys used brush and chisel because it is all they had. If they were around today, who knows what they would have done with a Nikon and Photoshop. Maybe they would have been great. Maybe not.

When I look at Bruni's portrait, I don't see naked vulnerability in those eyes. I see a challenge and some pride. I see attitude, and a healthy dose of bravery.

She needs to keep it.

Photos: Daily Mail & Raphael's La Fornarina