Fall/Winter 2012/2013 - Steidl

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Olivier Zahm
How to Photograph Women
Ever since Karl Lagerfeld gave him his first digital camera, Olivier Zahm – the co-founder and editor-in-chief of the
critically-acclaimed magazine Purple Fashion – has been taking pictures that he regularly publishes in the Night section
of his magazine as well as on his website, Purple Diary. This book largely features Zahm’s personal pictures from the
past seven years including images of nightlife and parties, friends, girlfriends, sex, celebrities, landscape and architecture.
His mostly black-and-white photos combine his favourite erotic references, such as the work of Nobuyoshi Araki, Helmut
Newton, and Richard Kern with a typically nineties snapshot aesthetic which gives a feeling of intimacy and reality to
his pictures. All images are credited and often commented on by Zahm, lending a direct, personal edge to this story.
Olivier Zahm worked as an art critic for Artforum, Flash Art, Art Press and Texte zur Kunst during the 1980s and early
1990s. He is a renowned curator and has worked on over 150 exhibitions of contemporary art, for institutions including
the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the Centre Pompidou in Paris. In 1992, Zahm founded Purple Prose
magazine (1992–1998) with Elein Fleiss, and the publication has created spin-offs such as Purple Fiction (1992–
1998), Purple Sexe (1998–2001), Purple magazine (1998–2003), Purple Journal (2004–present), Purple Fashion
(1995–1998, 2004–present), and Purple Books, a publishing house. The “realistic”, sometimes dubbed “anti-fashion”
aesthetics of Purple was a reaction against the glamour of the eighties, and can be linked to the global counterculture
of that time, with the work of Juergen Teller, Terry Richardson, Wolfgang Tillmans, and Mario Sorrenti.
OLIVIER ZAHM
HOW TO
PHOTOGRAPH
WOMEN
Olivier Zahm
How to Photograph Women
Book design by Purple Institute
500 pages
8.2 x 12 in. / 21 x 30.5 cm
750 photographs
Duotone and four colour process
Softcover with dust jacket
€ 65.00 / £ 50.00 / US$ 88.00
ISBN 978-3-86930-552-3
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