An Australian women's soccer team premiered their nude calendar Tuesday. Reports indicate the session attracted just about every working journalist in the area to dive into a pile of 150 complementary calendars. And no wonder - it's called the first known full-frontal nude calendar, without coverup props, in the history of Australian sports.
''I think it's art," says forward Katrina Boyd of the Matildas to the Sydney Morning Herald. "If people want to call it porn, that's their problem. No one could make me feel low or sleazy about this. I feel strong and confident with what I have done with my body.''
That pile of complementary calendars disappeared in the first ten minutes, followed by what the paper calls a "race…to get the members of the Matildas to sign their respective photographs, in between interviews." The Matildas themselves appeared with blowups of their own nude images as they faced a sporting press corps they've often accused of ignoring their athletic skill and successes in the past.
The team is preparing for the next Olympics and say the calendar's purpose was raising their profile and gain maximum exposure. They even had final veto over which poses and photographs were used.
Boyd posed for one of the three full-frontal shots in the calendar and says she liked pushing the edges. ''I have no problem with nudity and I am happy and proud of the calendar,'' she tells the Herald. ''I think it is wonderful. The photos show we are great athletes with great bodies.
Even the team's mothers applauded. "The first time I saw it," says defender Traci Bartlett's mother, Sandra, "I thought, shock, horror! But posing nude, it's art - they are all so trim and firm … good on them."
The project was instigated by Prime Publishing director Ettore Flacco, himself a soccer fan, saying he was dismayed by the Matlidas' lack of publicity following this year's World Cup - the biggest stand-alone women's sports event in history. ''I suggested the calendar be nude so it would sell,'' Flacco says.
And Australian Women's Soccer Association president Shirley Brown considers the Matildas calendar a great idea to break the no-profile/no-money cycle. ''The team doesn't get recognized for their athletic achievement, so we have to get people's attention first to convert people to watch the women play,'' she tells the Herald.
Flacco bankrolled the $250,000 project and twelve Matildas agreed to pose. A first print of 5,000 was proposed but media interest pushed it to 25,000 and then to 45,000, and there are said to be strong hopes for a second print run. The Matildas get a dollar a calendar but the women insist the idea was lifting the team's profile.
