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by Thierry Le Gouès
Foreword by Veronica Webb
Photography / Fashion / Black Nudes
Paperback with french flaps
11 x 13.5 inches
104 pages
65 quadritone photographs
ISBN: 978-1-57687-041-9
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“Iman walks over to the set…. It’s a spooky vision. She looks like an Egyptian sculpture come to life. Le Gouès doesn’t say much, neither does anyone else. What is there to do but shut up and stare?”
—Veronica Webb
At times Thierry Le Gouès appears to be more of a sculptor than a photographer. His photographs of female nudes seem to depict figures more chiseled from stone than made of flesh and blood. Some images echo the streamlined, abstract human forms of sculptor Constantin Brancusi. In other shots, the stark contrast of light on the models’ dark skin makes them appear like graceful, futuristic automatons. Le Gouès, a fashion photographer by trade, began taking and collecting the photos for this book in order to expose the beauty of black women, whom he feels are underrepresented in the world of high-fashion modeling. Of the finished collection, he says: “Soul is an homage to my medium, which is the models who are my inspiration.” To create his inimitable signature portraits, Le Goues covers his models—women such as Naomi Campbell and Iman—in greasepaint and poses them against stark, vacant backgrounds to heighten the sculptural elements of their forms. The resulting photographs are sensual, stirring, and beautiful works of art.
Thierry Le Gouès, born in Brittany, France, is
currently a fashion photographer residing in New
York City and Paris. Le Gouès’ work is frequently
published in such top beauty magazines as Harper’s
Bazaar USA, Glamour, Allure, Vogue, France, Vogue
Hommes International, Vogue UK, and Arena. In 1992 Le Gouès had his first solo exhibition of photographs in Paris on the theme of indigenous Southern
American populations. Photographs from Soul were
exhibited in Cape Town, South Africa in 1995.
Veronica Webb, a former top fashion model, was
the first African-American woman to sign an
exclusive contract with a major cosmetics
company. Webb is also an accomplished journalist
and is a contributing editor for Details, Esquire,
Elle, The London Sunday Times, The New York
Times, and is an editor at large for Interview
Magazine. With interests also in both film and
television, Webb was featured in Jungle Fever and
Malcolm X by Spike Lee, and has appeared as a host
on MTV, and VH1.
