Andrew Martinez and the nude microclimate

The cover of Nude & Natural issue 12.2 features a photograph of Debbie Moore, Nina Schilling, and Marty Kent of The X-Plicit Players interactive performance art group, gathered on the steps of Sproul Plaza at the University of California Berkeley. With them, Andrew Martinez, who had recently attracted international media attention for his decision to attend classes while entirely nude. The cover photo was captioned, “The Naked Guy—A New Micro-Culture?”¹

Andrew Martinez’s nude activism began several years before he arrived in Berkeley. According to a 2006 article in the New York Times, in the summer of 1990, at seventeen, Martinez had “fallen under the nonconformist spell of Henry David Thoreau” and began questioning the rationality of having to wear clothing in 90-degree weather. After requesting the permission of several neighbors in his Cupertino, California hometown, Martinez walked down Highway 9 “wearing nothing and carrying a sign that read, ‘I was born naked and so were you.’”² …