Catalan nudism foresees an encouraging future

One more summer, the Illa Roja beach in Begur will head the human chain to defend freedom and respect for nudists in this space. The most recent case for which this cove became known was the conflict that broke out in 2021 between naturists and the owners of a beach bar which, under pressure from naturist associations, had to close. This cove is a space that became a symbol of the nudist movement, and became a sanctuary for international naturism during the Transition, thanks to the drive of pioneers and groups like the Catalan Naturism Club. Although this practice has gone through rather low moments in recent years, and the average age is usually quite high, more and more young people are claiming it as a liberation from aesthetic pressure. 

Iván Vera is one. Born in Badalona, this 27-year-old decided to explore this world as a reaction to a conservative upbringing and amidst a process of self-body acceptance. “As a teenager, I had many body image issues. Nudism helped me overcome these feelings and I accepted that there is a diversity of bodies, that all are valid,” he explains. However, the reasons that lead people to practice naturism are as diverse as the human body itself. For this reason, Iván recommends not skipping the first step, and the most fundamental one: doing research. “I started towards the end of adolescence, at 16 or 17 years old. The first steps were not in public either. I come from a family with no naturist tradition, and that's why I started practicing it at home, assimilating my daily reality in private with nudity,” he emphasizes.

Once he came of age, Iván joined the Catalan Naturist Club (CCN) to get in touch with other young people with similar concerns. Despite the scarce popularity of naturism among new generations, Catalan naturist associations are a prime example in terms of activities and awareness campaigns. We often tend to associate nudism with the beach, but the reality is quite different. Who says you can't show your naked body in winter? The group of young people from the CCN organizes many group activities to enjoy this practice, from naturist spa sessions and meetings to play board games in the colder months, to naturist hiking routes, yoga, or drawing "au naturel".

Iván assures that naturism has had a profoundly positive impact on his body acceptance. On the other hand, he emphasizes that this evolution from adolescence to today has not been and is not linear. "After all, society pushes you towards the other extreme. No matter how determined you are to accept yourself, there are always fluctuations. The way I perceive myself and others has been changing on this journey," he acknowledges.

“Hypersexualization is here and it's very difficult to ignore. It often manifests in a much more aggressive way towards the female body. However, the human body will always be linked to consumption, especially that of women. If it cannot be consumed, it is not valid,” he denounces. Ivan is very active on social media, where he engages in conscious activism to maintain good practice in this world. On the contrary, he suffers recurrently from censorship in the digital environment. “It's a gray balance. While on Instagram content that borders on pornography is accepted, naturist accounts are still frowned upon,” he clarifies. 

The president of the Naturist-Nudist Federation of Catalonia (FNNC), Segimon Rovira, while confident that there is a generational change, does not believe that the current political and social circumstances will contribute to improving naturism conditions. "If I compare the times when I started with the current ones, I see that society has not evolved as positively as I thought. We are in regression in Europe. It is not just a matter of exposure on social media or hyper-sexualization of the body, but a more conservative drift has also settled across the continent, nudity is being restricted, and censorship is making a comeback".

If we look more closely, phenomena such as involuntary exposure on social media favor a hyper-sexualization of the body that represses those who want to start in the world of naturism. A clear example can be found at Sant Sebastià beach in Barcelona. Despite being a nudist tradition since the Second Republic, mass tourism and lack of signage make it increasingly difficult to remove swimwear without being susceptible to ending up in someone else's mobile phone gallery. The Catalan capital is a clear example of how urban dynamics and lack of political interest have almost expelled them from the city. Mar Bella beach, in the Poblenou neighborhood, is today the only one with a sign indicating that it is indeed a nudist space. However, it continues to be a mirage to see naked bathers among the thousands of people happily enjoying this beach in swimwear.

Younger people acknowledge that it is increasingly difficult to find comfortable spaces to start in naturism. In fact, the pandemic marked a turning point. The de-confinement boosted the spread of secluded coves and beaches, but these publications often omitted the information that they were nudist spaces. Now, this trend has not changed. There are approximately seventy nudist beaches in Catalonia, but not all of them have the same conditions for starting to practice naturism.