I fell in love with this man’s work a very long time ago. This British photographer is the living, breathing, insane-photo-taking reason why I want to do fashion photography. I will never forget what inspired it. The UK Vogue April 2004 issue featured a spread inspired by glitter, spotlights and dragonflies. The spread featured two of my favourite models, Gemma Ward and Lily Cole, both of them only about 15 years old at the time. Til this very day, I still keep these precious pictures in a box far away for safe-keeping.
There is something about these pictures that grips me. Oftentimes I find myself drawn to photographs, not knowing who they are by, and then only later find out that he is the artist behind it all. He has shot campaigns for Louis Vuitton, Calvin Klein and my favourite one of them all (an ad I have loved for years, having appeared in that very same Vogue UK April ’04, and only discovered yesterday was shot by him), the Dior Addict Perfume spread.
Though these pictures were shot years ago they’re still as fresh and as edgy as they were back then. The way he uses light and holds the drama of his subjects in each image is extremely compelling. He knows how to capture something – I’m not quite sure what- beyond the appearance of his subjects. Transforming it from fashion into life beyond itself. Artists like him challenge viewers who hold the superficial notion that – fashion, style, vision – are simply on the exterior. Rather, he provides a window for the viewer to look deeper. His photographs renews the appreciation of fashion and photography as deeper art forms, as opposed to pictures that are just well composed, or caught a good moment by chance. He strips fashion and photography down to their essence : photography is created through light, fashion is not merely covering the body, but doing so in a way considered as art.
