Photographer : Alessandro Furchino Alessandro sites : Tumblr / photography site
The reader who commented Victoria of the blog Style MarmaladeHer comment "Well, what can I say about the photo... The attitude and spontaneous shot is priceless"
My thoughts When I first saw this picture I don't know why but an image of James Dean came to my mind. Let's be honest none of the models actually look like him but I just had this feeling. I believe I felt that way because I found these boys looked reckless. Alessandro did give a title to this photograph : "The Rats". As you may know this noun usually used to describe a rodent, when applied to humans turns out to be a nasty word. I enjoyed reading the different definitions of this lovely substantive (when applied to our species, yes I am not into rodents) and found it described well our bad boys.Just like Victoria stated this picture is all about the attitude. It was only when I read her comment that I understood why I thought about James Dean. Just like him these boys have the same attitude : reckless, rebel. In brief, they exude a certain bad boy attitude that doesn't exist anymore. By that I mean the cool bad boy who in the end is looking for the meaning of his life and is against the society of his time because it doesn't let him express himself. In addition to this, their style reminds me of the 50's because of their revisited bomber jackets. But they actually differ from the hero of Rebel without a Cause because they are chic and modern bad boys. And that is precisely because of this last point that I consider this picture to belong to the fashion photography genre.This photograph is certainly a fashion image but it did not attract me for this reason. More than the usual fashion picture where the models have to look beautiful and polished, I felt these boys looked spontaneous as Victoria wrote. My opinion has certainly something to do with the cigarette and their glance. They don't look like posing, it seems to me that Alessandro didn't want a polished fashion picture but instead wanted a rough and kind of spontaneous photograph. Usually in fashion photography (as far as I know and perceive it) everything is perfect but here it's not : the hand of the model on the left side is partially blurred. This is certainly due to the fact that the model was really smoking and just moved naturally while doing it. Dare I say that it was on purpose that Alessandro left an imperfection ?Remember my post about male and female models ? In it I was stating that I felt male models could express themselves much more than the female because you could perceive their personality on catwalks and on pictures. I mentioned models like James Quaintance and Bradley Soileau whose tattoes definitely reveal a part of their lifestyle. Here in this picture the model on the right side has a piercing in his nose which definitely distinguish him and reveal a part of who he is. More than having been chosen because of his physical appearance, I bet he was selected because he would bring a more spontaneous feel and the right amount of recklessness to the photograph. In brief, for me Alessandro Furchino is the kind of fashion photographer I like the most because when watching at his work, I want to say more than the word "beautiful".
Though I have only begun doing these kind of posts, I enjoy it. See, if not for Victoria's comment I would not have understood my first impression of the picture. Like the other forms of art, photography can enable us to dialog more, that is why I am planning on doing more of these "photography dialog posts" since I want this blog to be a place where we exchange opinions.
So tell me, do you appreciate my initiative ?