Lingerie photography and Smoke photography, combined for the first time, in my submission for the contest ‘l’Art du Style’ by Montreal shopping center Complexe les Ailes.
Complexe les Ailes is a mall downtown Montreal on St-Catherine Street. When they organized the contest ‘L’art du Style’, I was immediately interested in participating. Artists were asked to submit creative and artistic projects, based on one of a list of 10 trendy products that are sold in different stores at the mall. The products ranged from lipstick to a kids’ dress, from running shoes to.. lingerie. I was originally inspired by the nail polish, but when I saw the many submissions for that product already, I dediced to change my idea and submit my ideas for the lingerie by La vie en Rose. In a sketch, I showed how I wanted to do a series of pictures in which the focus was on the lingerie, almost abstract, and combine some model pictures with my smoke photography. Ten finalists would be chosen, 1 by facebook votes, and 9 by a jury. Thanks to many friends and fans, I got the ‘prix du public’ by receiving the most votes for my submission on facebook.
Being in the 10 finalists, I got to execute my project, within a budget set by Complexe les Ailes. I contacted the head office of La vie en Rose, here in Montreal, and they were happy to provide me with the next collection for the shoot. In search for models, I contacted Scoop Agency and they were willing to have two of their models work with me for the project, Melissa and Jany-Eve. For make-up and hair, I called upon Cynthia Dulude and Judy Bellefeuille. The shoot for the project took place at the studio of Alexandre Huppertz, who also assisted me during the shoot. Marc Desaulniers also joined us to make a behind the scenes video.
Everybody was great to work with and I think the pictures came out great. There was definately some time pressure as there was a hard deadline for the art work, but everything was ready on time and the large stand-out prints on metallic paper were delivered to Complexe les Ailes a couple of days before their exhibit in the mall began. Fellow photographer Ben Von Wong came to help me fix the prints to the wall in the Complexe les Ailes mall.
As I had won the ‘prix du public’, a smaller version of the prints was on display in a dedicated tent, just a couple of steps away from the main stage of the Montreal Fashion and Design Festival on McGill College, where thousands and thousands of people walked by in the course of the 4 day festival. In the mall, my prints were on display for 2 months.
I did not win the first prize of the contest, that went to Simon L’Archeveque’s silkscreen printings, but this was definitely a great experience that offered valuable exposure in Montreal.
Thanks to everybody who supported me, and to everybody that helped out with the project and made it possible.
