Frances Borzello's approach to writing was forged in her teens by dinner table arguments with her father. Women can't be chefs, he said. But you say that mummy's food is better than a restaurant, she said . She lost the argument and had to wait till she was older to understood how received ideas
dictate our beliefs . Her first book, The Artist's Model , contrasted the view of models as always nude and female with the historic reality of the male body as the embodiment of perfection. Book No. 2 Civilising Caliban, showed the Victorians using the refining power of paintings to equip the poor to refuse the alcoholic invitation of public houses. Her third book , Seeing Ourselves, a history of female self portraits, reveals women artists finding socially acceptable ways to present their pride in their profession in the centuries when women were admired for their modesty . The interaction of the world of art with the world around us continues in book No 8, the forthcoming Naked Nude, which traces the inability of Kenneth Clark's brilliant formation of the artistic category of the nude -- the naked body with 'no uncomfortable overtones - to cope with the outspoken and often embarrassing honesty of the nude today.
