Juergan Teller
16:55
Juergan Teller is a german fashion and fine art photographer. His work is ordinarily in colour, in a overexposed, raw style, shot with a Contax G2 camera with an onboard flash. His style is marked by his refusal to separate commercial fashion images with personal images, and his work is quite often controversial. He has long standing ties with Marc Jacobs and Celine in advertising, these campaigns in particular are what first drew me towards his work as I love the over exposed, neutral finish which his images have.
This highly controversial series which began as an advertising campaign for marc jacobs, Teller identifies as his most memorable shoot. Titled 'Self portrait with Charlotte Rampling', the set of images push the boundaries for the 'expected' fashion image.
I have chosen to include this image in my essay comparing this and a Corinne Day photograph as it has had a big impact on my narrative project and they way I view fashion imagery. It makes the viewer ask so many questions as it is so unconventional. I discovered that Teller wanted to be in the photograph with Charlotte Rampling as he didn't want another model being in a position he would wanted to be in. Also that he was too fat to fit into any of Marc Jacobs designs apart from one pair of silver shiny boxers, which is why he is only wearing them.
I found that I viewed the photograph much differently when I read through the interviews with Teller and discovered all the thought processes and the context surrounding the image.
This article I found on http://www.scmp.com/magazines/48-hours/article/1820561/juergen-teller-self-portraits-and-licking-charlotte-ramplings-ear explains some of the questions I had regarding the reasoning behind this specific shoot and also why he chose to shoot self portrait over models:
When asked the reasoning behind the shoot, Teller explained;
"She's such an icon in the art house movie industry and such a desired, however, unreachable woman. The concept was basically "I am with her and I have her". And I'm the one who kisses her and touches her breasts. It's a dream for many men to be there, but it's impossible. And for me it was possible. I wanted to do something which I have never seen before. I wanted to go on an adventure and we had an adventure."
Why self portraits?
"When I became famous for doing fashion photography, I felt a bit tired of doing that. I felt emotionally drained by the vanity. I just thought I might as well just photograph myself. It is incredibly liberating. There's nobody to tell me I can't show this double chin. I was able to push the limit to my own pleasing. I wanted to literally see how it looks like and feels to be photographed by me, the sense of knowing when a good picture is happening, and that helps me to photograph other people. And it helps me also when other people are looking at my self-portraits — they enter into a totally different level of understanding of who I am and what I want to achieve within my work."
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