Friday, November 13, 2009

Lesbians to bare all in calendar drive to raise funds for gay support centre

A GROUP of 16 lesbians will do a full monty photo shoot in Limerick next Sunday for a fundraising Christmas calendar.

While most of the photography will be done indoors, some of the women will have to brave the elements for outdoor shots, which will have a sporting, motorbike and chainsaw theme.

The calendar is being brought out by the Limerick Rainbow Services, which provides advice and support for gays, lesbians and transsexuals.

Rainbow co-ordinator Vanessa Buswell, who will pose, said: "Nobody will be seen visibly fully nude in the calendar. We met last night to firm up on the final details and we have engaged professional photographer Selina O’Meara for the day-long shoot. I may be pictured on my own or with another woman. But my partner won’t be taking part as we try to keep our private life separate. We are working out the logistics."

All 16 women will appear on the cover in a kitchen setting.

Vanessa said: "As well as the cover, we will have 12 pages of pictures and one page for ads. We hope to sell all the advertising space on that page for €1,800, with spaces selling for €200 for three inches by one inch space.

"Some of our women’s group came up with the idea and as we are going through difficult financial times everybody was up for it. Extra women came forward to volunteer to take part in the calendar photo shoot."

The calendar will be ready early next month and will sell for €10.

Vanessa said their women support group got the calendar idea from the Yorkshire Women’s Institute, who posed nude to raise money for Leukaemia Research and whose nude calendar project went on to be made into a film.

She said: "With government cutbacks, we need to raise as much money as we can. We get funding from the HSE, so we’ve had a 2% cut this year. Our main grant of around €57,000 only covers a third of our costs. In the past, we’ve been lucky to get some smaller grants, but there’s a lot more competition now. We don’t know if we’re looking at further cuts in the budget."
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