Guy Bourdin was a storyteller. An architect of the unconventional, capable of condensing complete novels into a single, ineffable image. To commemorate and reimagine his remarkable works, Giorgio Armani has reopened its inimitable Armani/Silos showspace doors inviting The Guy Bourdin Estate to display the late photographer’s off-the-wall stills – which are hung, quite literally, on the walls of the exhibition rooms.
Coinciding with Milan Fashion Week, it’s a riveting retrospective dubbed Guy Bourdin: Storyteller, and it illustrates his use of psychedelic colour and texture, shifting and melting into constantly evolving, hypnotic forms that seamlessly blend reality and fantasy. There are 100 glossy photographs on view, both iconic and unseen, of which 21 are beautiful, black and white compositions.
Delving into his narrative-based madcap approach, a blitz of unbridled creativity is unleashed upon entry to Armani/Silos, unloading an assault on the senses pervaded by punchy hues, early 20th-century avant-garde ideas and an effervescent surrealist aesthetic.
Born in Paris in 1928, Bourdin first played with his anthropomorphic compositions using paint; entering into a meticulous study of hyperreal colour and composition between light and shadow, the absurd and the sublime. Turning, in the 50s, to an autodidact photographer with no formal training, he quickly honed in on a uniquely personal style, steeped in surrealist references sparked as the result of his long-standing friendship with Man Ray. He also drew inspiration from the likes of Alfred Hitchcock, photographing commercial ads alluding to crime scenes or police chases and the theme of the “mysterious plot”). Lewis Caroll’s child-centric psychedelia wormed its way into his work too, cleverly fusing a European aesthetic with the post-war pop culture of the American west coast.
With an already impressive repertoire, he then plunged into a quid pro quo with Vogue Paris, which spawned seminal photoshoots and ad campaigns boasting immense creative freedom. He worked for Harper’s Bazaar too and captured acclaimed campaigns for the likes of Chanel, Charles Jourdan, Pentax and Bloomingdales’, concentrating on the image itself, rather than the product, before his passing in 1991.
“This exhibition is further confirmation of my intention to make Armani/ Silos a centre of contemporary photography culture, embracing everything related to the Armani world as well as things that couldn’t be further from it,” Mr. Armani commented. “At first glance, Guy Bourdin is not an artist with whom I have a lot in common: his language is clear-cut, graphic, and impactful. A sense of provocation is immediately evident in his work but what strikes me the most – and what I wanted to focus on – is instead his creative freedom, his narrative skill and his great love of cinema. Bourdin did not follow the crowd and he did not com- promise and I identify with that. I don’t believe that there is any other way to make a mark on the collective imagination.”
Widely admired for his ever-relevant, soul-simulating imagery and a peerless career characterised by smash hit after hit, Bourdin’s legacy lives on; with lacquered red lips, mystifying models and fantastical photos.
Photography by Guy Bourdin. “Guy Bourdin: Storyteller” is open to the public through to 31 August 2023.
