Found

Sally // Stella Mccartney // Paola Petrobelli // Natalia Vodianova

I have been searching for something this week. The most memorable thing I have found was Emma Hardy's most perfect photographs. 

"Emma Hardy is well practiced in capturing the nuances of our everyday performances. Her images reflect an often unnoticed drama behind the scenes. Emma finds inspiration in the chaos and unexpected beauty of life, the less seen moments in between, for each commercial client she challenges herself to bring her sense of authenticity to a necessarily constructed commercial brief, “I photograph with my heart engaged, and however manufactured an instance in photography, the test is to bring soul into commerce”.

Describing her aesthetic as raw but tender, Hardy finds beauty in imperfection, and polish in the detail of every day life. And through her lens, the most ordinary of moments appears steeped in romance and intrigue, as if her subjects are characters in a movie playing in her head."

If that's not the most perfect artist bio I've read well...yeah. 

Photos: Emma Hardy represented by East Photographic

desire

"Her pictures always turn on an intimacy between the subject and herself, a sort of private collaborative energy that's beyond all the conventional "gazes"...You see the person in her work, not the icon, not the guy, not the girl. And the result is always deliciously and joyously hot."

I want my summer to feel the same way Cass Bird's photos do. Deliciously hot. 

Photos: Cass Bird

Escape

"Imagine if you could travel to the bottom of the world, to total serene paradise, with ten of your friends for a week and just drive around the south island, listening to flying nun tunes, eating wild apples off the side of the road, sleeping in the middle of nowhere, visiting towns with population of four people, driving through endless country roads, passing magical cliffs over and over again, getting lost – and that was your job.Our first day of shooting started with running through sports fields in the mist, like a scene from Virgin Suicides, Anja jumping around like a kid who ate too much candy, on the way to travel up hundreds of metres above land in gondolas. When we reached the top it really was like we were at the end of the world, I can’t even think of words to explain what we could see and where we were, so I won’t try..."  Zara Mirkin for Russh

It's one of those campaigns, those journeys, collaborations, moments, whatever you want to say it is, that just falls together so perfectly and sits a little deeper than simply what your eyes see. 

It has given me a renewed sense of urgency to get to New Zealand and explore their landscape discover my own serene paradise that Zara speaks of.

Photographically - it's perfection. I remember watching Tim Barber on Camera Bag TV and wanting to see more but failing to follow through. Thankfully Glassons prompted the reitroduction and I am having a good ol time devouring his archived work. Jessica Ann Strother for Asos a definite highlight. 

If you hadn't noticed - Glassons is quickly becoming a thing. Catch up here

Photos: campaign by Tim Barber, behind the scenes by Zara Mirkin  

When Life Was Exotic

The satisfaction my eyes feel when everything that makes up a picture locks in and settles just right, perfectly even.

Photos: Camilla Akrans for Vogue Japan feat Nadja Bendon styled by Sissy Vian 

she got game

 

This was a look behind the scenes of Tim Ashton shooting an exclusive for Fashion Gone Rogue.

He has an eye for clean lines, ridiculously great light, shape & colour. He takes chaos and simplifies it in a way my mind sometimes can't even comprehend. He's pretty handsome and wants me to be on all of his shoots. I think we both scored.

x

Photos: Behind the scenes by Rachel Kara.
'She Got Game' by Tim Ashton for Fashion Gone Rogue feat Melissa Bell & Katherina Webster. Hair Luke Davis Makeup Desiree Wise Stylist Monique Moynihan

it's almost

 “Each day, with a renewed sense of wonder and curiosity, I would sling the camera over my shoulder and set out to explore a new neighbourhood, chase the the shimmering, golden light reflecting off skyscrapers and observe the comings and goings of beautiful strangers.”

Elize has a magical ability to shoot through a subject or scene and extract the soul of it - to so generously share with you, me, us. I look at her photos of New York and am beautifully reminded of the community spirit that can live in a city, in a season. 

I feel spent of all energy as I wake this humid & dull Monday. I worked through the weekend, hidden from the pleasurable tease of summer whilst everyone basked and boasted with their talk and pictures of sea and sand! So I'm gonna add a ittle light to my morning and browse some more of her wonderful photographs. You should really join me. 

Photos: New York by Elize Strydom