It turns out my efforts to represent the shading of the child’s body with layers of differently colored fabric was misconstrued and interpreted as “clothes” by the majority of people who viewed the piece. Very few spontaneously saw him as naked. This was because the contrast between the lights and darks was too great – an artifact of the limited pallet of flesh-toned shades of fabric I was able to assemble.
Original Piece
So I darkened the ligher elements with crayon and wax pastels and stabilized the shading using a hot iron which melts the applied surface wax into the fabric. Now the child is seen as naked.
Child Darkened
I’m much happier with how people are responding.
jmn 
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Hm. I didn’t see it as clothing, but since you mention it, I guess I get it. But yes, your changes do help make the skin tone more obvious. I’ve used crayons to change colors before, too. Good fix.
Thanks
Great class! Can you send us the dates for the next classes!