liquid luxe…

Winning entry for British Hair Awards

Hair by Erika Salvaggio

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Makeup Keti Nikolova
Model Andy @ Lenis

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Sacrilege was on the UK Bestseller list at the time of shooting.

Thanks to Dominic Forbes and Helen McFarland from Harper Collins.

Styling Lenka Padysakova

Shot this earlier in the year. Look Book/Advertising for Jan Si.

Model:Elisabetu Stanciute

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For the September ’12 issue of BA’s Inflight Magazine

Acting Art Director: Sarah Browne
Hair & Makeup Linda Andersson

Stylist Erika Ippolito
Hair Erika Salvaggio
Makeup Jay Arik
Model Vika @ Models1

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Makeup Mutsumi Shibihara
Model Viktoria @ Lenis Models

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Not sure whether to categorise this as a beauty test or a fashion test. Makeup: Mutsumi Shibihara, Hair: Gigi Hammond

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I shot this for Vita in early January. Her collection was inspired by woodland nymphs so we wanted to create a kind of autumnal forest mood. more images on her site

Model Kasia Kay @ Zone
Hair and Makeup: Louise McCarthy
Asst.: Cat Linton

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Although he was something of an evil despot, suppressing his people relentlessly, I also found him rather comical.

Here’s some pictures of Kim Jong Il looking at things to remind you of what a clown he was:

http://kimjongillookingatthings.tumblr.com/

The legend has it that he died while travelling by train. Oh ‘Dear Leader’, you will not be missed.

A good friend of mine from Ohio, who’s a massive photography aficionado asked me about where to see Photography in London. This is my response to his request:

Photography in London

Tate Modern frequently has good shows on including comprehensive retrospectives of established artists. A Diane arbus show just finished there and there are 2 shows on there I want to check out at the moment:

http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/

The Photographer’s Gallery is about to re open in early 2012 and frequently has great shows on although the space isn’t huge. Just before they closed they had a Sally Mann retrospective which I really enjoyed.

The Victoria and Albert Museum has a massive archive of photography and they feature photography frequently. They have a show on at the moment which looks interesting (but isn’t strictly photography) about postmodernism:

http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/exhibitions/postmodernism/postmodernism-about-the-exhibition/

The National Portrait Gallery always has some great photography showing in the permanent collection. The Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize 2011 is on at the moment which always has a really high standard. I haven’t seen this year’s yet. Critics haven’t been kind about this year’s show, saying things like it’s the same show every year and the work all looks the same but last year’s show was great. I do agree that they tend to show a particular type of portrait, quite composed, direct to camera, mostly daylight, possibly slightly desaturated. I think they need to look for ‘le petit quelque chose qui fout tout par terre’, which means ‘the little thing that fucks everything up,’ according to Christian Laboutin.

I always check the Telegraph’s Photography Section which seems to have the best listings and the best online photography section of any of the Papers . And Time Out is worth checking out to see what the major shows are that are on at the moment.

My girlfriend is an artist so she drags me around to a lot of art shows too which is great cause I get to see a lot of stuff I wouldn’t otherwise check out. Recently I really enjoyed the Wilhelm Sasnal at the Whitechapel Gallery. It’s a painting show which I wouldn’t have gone to see otherwise but the real gem on at the Whitechapel was the Government Art Collection curated by Cornelia Parker. Go for Grayson Perry’s etching alone although there’s plenty of other unusual, quirky and fun pieces on show too. And the curation is a joy in itself.

The Hayward Gallery generally has some great Art on show. Although I have to say I was bored by Pipilotti Rist’s tedious navel-gazing ‘Eyeball Massage’. The show would have been great in a nightclub as background wallpaper but in a gallery context felt dated, frivolous and tedious. Also showing in the Hayward is George Condo. I don’t think Mr. Condo is someone I’d like to meet. I found his art derivative and puerile. But don’t let that put you off the Hayward, The British Art Show 7 (in the Days of the Comet) earlier in the year was truly inspiring, surprising, fresh and thoughtful.

Oh and don’t forget the Barbican. Previously they’ve had big shows of Nobuyoshi Araki and David LaChapelle although their emphasis on Photography seems to have waned in recent years.

And as you’d expect in a city of this size, there are loads of smaller galleries such as Printspace, Flowers East, RifleMaker et al. And a stroll down Cork Street or Vyner Street is always rewarding….

(Andreas Gursky’s Rhein II which recently sold for $4,338,500 at Christies, New York in November 2011, currently the highest price paid for a photograph. Dodgy photoshopping though, ay?)

Shot this a long time ago. It wasn’t published in the end. Such a pity… but you gotta move on. Hope you like it.

Styling:Holly Chaves
Makeup:Gigi Hammond

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Fashion Editorial for Face On Magazine

Model: Jessie @ Premier Model Management
Styling: Holly Dowsett
Hair and Makeup Paula Valencia

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Clara is a recent graduate who wanted a look book of her final collection. Model is the lovely Carola

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William Wilde designs primarily in latex. We shot this look book to showcase his new collection ‘Vixen, Kill, Kill”

Hair and Makeup by the talented Steph Lai

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12►

Just in case any of you think I’ve unfriended you anwyhere, I thought I’d let you know that I’ve removed my profiles from Facebook, Twitter and Google Plus as I felt I was wasting time on them and I find some of their practices abhorrent. In particular facebook’s attempts to become the second internet which involves knowing even more about you including your music tastes and where you happen to be in geographical space at any moment in time. Not to mention facial character recognition. Just a bit too creepy for me, thanks, especially when it’s all in the name of selling advertising.

I also dislike the way twitter forces people to think in soundbites. While I admire attempts to be concise and clear in thinking, I have the feeling that complex thoughts are not well expressed in 140(?) characters and encouraging people to think like this is a definite dumbing down of our culture.

This desire to disconnect from these services occurred after a recent trip to China where most social networking services – facebook, twitter, even youtube are blocked by the Chinese government. While I don’t condone censorship in any form, I came to realise how little I need these services and how much time I waste on them. Shortly after my return, I stared reading ‘Jaron Lanier – You are not a Gadget A Manifesto’ which seemed to reinforce my decision:

“Online culture is filled to the brim with rhetoric about what the true path to a better world ought to be, and these days it‟s strongly biased toward an antihuman way of thinking.”

I may start a facebook page in the future for my Photography but I no longer want to have a public profile.

Stylist Kelvin Barron
Hair Vicki Lord
Makeup Paula Valencia

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TFNC asked me to create some new images to update their site. Fun shoot. Thanks to Olivia at TFNC for organising everything.

MUA and Hair: Gigi Hammond

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Shot La Roux for a Nissan Campaign just before christmas. Really nice to chat with actually, very down to earth.

Thanks to everyone at Digitas agency for putting the shoot together.

You can see more of the collection at http://belle-et-bonbon.com/

Models Lina and Heather @ Nevs

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read it and weep. did I really say I like having sex to relax? they must have caught me at a kooky moment:

http://urbanitychic.com/2011/06/the-spotlight/photographers/spotlight-interview-hugh-omalley-photography/

Came across these in my archives. Simple look book for Jeannie McQueeny.

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Makeup Louise McCarthy
Model Catia Gomes

I think these work best you when you see them as a series.

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Oh dear, where to start…

I went with little expectations to this show in terms of content, but was expecting it to be of a similar calibre to last years work which was exceptional. Because the photographer’s gallery at Ramilies Street is currently being renovated, the show is temporarily at Ambika P3 gallery just beside Baker Street. The space is a bit unusual – I think it used to be a concrete testing facility – but don’t quote me on that. Upshot is, it’s quite industrial in feel which might gel well with Thomas Demand’s work but not so well with the others in the show.

As you enter the show, a large scale image by Thomas Demand hits you front and centre and is installed as if on a large stage which complements the work nicely but strikes me as a bit odd as it’s the only one that has this degree of curation. It would have been nice to see a little more of his work in the show. If I remember rightly this was the only piece.

Roe Etheridge’s work trumpets it’s eclectic nature and the fact that there’s a mix of commercial work and personal work but leaves you with a patchy feeling as if it’s neither here nor there, a bit random but not in a good way, yet I have to say that personally I liked his work the best as it genre hops and leaves you a little perplexed but in a fun way.

Elad Lassry, the work is a bit too dry for me. It screams CONCEPTUAL all over the place in a sort of wanky art school way with nothing to grasp hold of.

Jim Goldberg, individually the pictures are impressive but the way they are curated is a mess and leaves you not wanting to engage with it at all. One whole wall is nearly empty while Roe Etheridge and Elad Lassry’s work is cramped together into one confusing cube.

Overall I was very disappointed with the show and felt that if these are the photographers who’ve contributed the most to contemporary photography in the last year then it’s in a pretty poor state. But I know that not to be the case. It’s a selection panel’s bad taste and poorly curated to boot.

I know this work is supposed to make us question what photography is as a medium but intellectual games are boring to play when the images don’t seduce. They don’t need to be pretty but show them to us in a way that makes us want to look.

Maybe next year…

Images from a recent client shoot. New Jewellery Designer Miranda McCarthy. Pieces for sale via Paul Smith. Main website for London Bird

Hair and Makeup: Steph Lai
Model: Nadia @ FM

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simple test with Agnes @ Premier

Makeup: Gigi Hammond
Thanks to Sissy Best at Premier.