I’ve had this ad forever. I tore it out of some mag and have had it stored or pinned up ever since. Its a powerful image not just because of the beautiful nude body and gorgeous Christy but because of what I can’t help but reading into as a bit of a play on gender reversal…
Christy Turlington stands facing directly to camera with a casual nonchalance usually attributed to men, the man stands submissively, naked and looking down. The fierce red of the textiles, her whimsical feminine hair, that penetrating finger, the loose phallic length of her jackets belt pointing towards his groin…. Its potent.
I had to do a bit of reverse image searching, Turlington-stalking to find out about the image. Shot along with some pretty beautiful others the campaign was created in 1994 for Versace by Richard Avedon.
Many of the images from the series resemble Greek sculptural bodily forms along with a certain cheekiness and power play by the female models of which many of the faces of the top supermodels of the era are present including Schiffer, Evangelista, Campbell and Moss.
The composition of the image is also very dominant and dramatic and I suppose appeals to my own sense for using space in my images.
Here are just a few more images from the campaign that I grabbed off Pintrest…
