Nicholas LaClair Photographer and Director for Print and Film

l’esthétique et la vie de la joie

I've had an aesthetic making its way through my brain for a while now - as a culmination from many different sources. While in Paris this past September, we ducked in to The Lapin Agile in Montmartre where Lautrec used to spend his time when he wasn't at the Moulin Rouge. The place was amazing, and despite what year it may be, there was nothing modern - just the feeling of ages and ages of people living as if it was their last day, and laughing until they cry in fits of drunken ecstasy. Forget that we ended up there on what must have been asian tourist night, the feel was still there ... just, potential. The walls were singing whether or not the crowd was. It made me think of the color pallette and emotion in the lithographs of Lautrec and Cheret. The colors carry the mood and remind me of Parisian food with colors you can feel and taste.

I've seen them all my life. Growing up, we had this one hanging in our livingroom:

And there was an insistance to all the run-ins with these posters. The colors began to work on me - and I've decided I want to use this inspiration - though perhaps sans the poses that are almost a precurser to pinup. So soon after returning I set up a test to shoot old polaroid on a 4x5 speed graphic using old glass with a coating I knew might give me the tangarine whites of these old prints. Since old pull-apart polaroid is completely unpredictable both for tones and exposure, I have a crispy stack of almosts. Out of them, and thanks to makeup artist Victoria Stiles and Sarah, a beautiful model who could patiently wait through 4 second exposures, I created this shot:

it's still a bit less vibrant by choice, but it's on the right track, and I'd like its softness and almost abstraction to inform an entire story I'll shoot soon. Someone pointed out that it's also nearer Japanese art in its 2D quality and the obligatory splash of red than it ever will be french lithography. Though I like that mixture. I only want to borrow a bit of their aesthetic, not recreate them altogether.

Hopefully soon I'll have more to show.

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