Publisher, art curator and hot-tub enthusiast Olivier Zahm helped change the face of fashion editorial when he co-launched the iconic Purple empire in 1992 with Elein Fleiss. Since then its gratuitous content has aided the international careers of many (such as Testino, Sorrenti and Richardson), opened up a new genre of couture smut, and showed you Kate Moss' chi-chis too many times to count.
Zahm didn't begin his career as a photographer, however in recent years he has started putting himself behind the lens – as well as in front of it, much like his BFF Uncle Terry. His first solo exhibition of images debuted in 2009 and he's begun to shoot for names like TANK Magazine, Zadig & Voltaire, Yasmine-Eslami Lingerie and, of course, everything Purple.
The aesthetic is exactly what you'd expect: grainy, monochrome, and totally pervy. Zahm is an notorious womaniser (he is French, after all) who was infamously in an open relationship with Natacha Ramsay until it broke up late last year... Maybe because he ran out of other women to shag. His personal photo diary is exemplary of this, particularly in shots taken at "be seen" places like the Boom Boom Room where his many shots with models look pre/post/during coitus.
Other editorials, such as his
Natalie White bondage shots, are borderline S&M and reminiscent of Richard Kern. It's not groundbreaking stuff, but will satisfy most people's hedonistic craving... as well as give them some pointers. Just last week Zahn opened a new show in LA called
The Secrets Of Photographing Women. We don't have the finer details of his secret recipe mapped out just yet, but we can confirm it requires a powerful influence, lots of emerging models, and the backing soundtrack
Sunglasses at Night.
More at
purplediary.fr/diary.