When New York-based photographer Ethan James Green was leafing through the Milan archives of the 61-year-old Pirelli Calendar, he was particularly struck by the editions shot by Richard Avedon and Herb Ritts in the 1990s. Featuring some of the world's most famous women, often nude, he felt the photographs “really capture the models and create beautiful, timeless images”.
Green, who is known for his intimate portraiture and signature black-and-white imagery, set out to achieve that same timelessness, but with a contemporary twist. Entitled Refresh and Reveal, his innovative take on The Cal™ features a diverse cast of singers, actors, artists and models photographed both on a raw, ungroomed Miami beach and in the studio. Each cast member helped select an outfit for the shoot that would reflect their personal relationship with nudity and how much they wanted to reveal. The resulting sensuality emphasizes the beauty, strength and individuality of the human body while highlighting how ideas of beauty have evolved and expanded over recent decades.
What beauty means today
“I was excited to explore beauty today and to be able to present it in a context like the Pirelli Calendar, which has always celebrated it,” says Green. “We're returning to the Calendar's origins and celebrating the body in new ways that reflect the current moment.”
The project's fashion director, former Vogue Fashion Director Tonne Goodman, says the shoot sought to balance “revealing something – a body, an attitude, a sexuality, a freedom” with “Pirelli's elegance and vision”. “You had to conceal to be able to reveal. That was the challenge, to find clothes that I could use as a device, not to express fashion but to express a personal attitude in revealing the body.” The models tried on numerous outfits, many skintight or sheer, or posed with palm fronds, driftwood and seaweed, often in the waves. “It was up to them how much they wanted to conceal or reveal, be vulnerable, or be bold,” adds Goodman.
A collaborative process
Green's governing principle in his work is collaboration, an approach that allows him to capture the distinctive, deeply personal beauty of his subjects in authentic, unfiltered ways. “The most important lesson I have learned as a photographer is that you get the best shot when the subject is feeling comfortable,” he says. “Even if I give a lot of direction during the shoot, I also make a lot of space for those I am photographing to work with me and give me feedback. I have always been very collaborative and open, and that is one of the things I focused on in the Pirelli Calendar.” Without exception, his cast agreed. Many attributed this to Green's former career as a model and his ability to understand being on the other side of the camera.
Goodman declared the shoot “wonderful”, adding: “Ethan has a great appreciation of elegance and the queer world, which is very important right now. The breadth of his experience as a photographer and his personality are truly reflected in the imagery he makes because he's very sensitive, very bold, and very unapologetic. I feel that combination, with the elegance that he can master in the studio through light and his direction, is remarkable.”
“A stamp of approval”
Each subject has two square-format images in the Calendar, one colour, one black-and-white, with one shot on the beaches of Miami's Virginia Key Beach Park and one at a studio set up at the site. The Calendar is presented in an elegant, distinctive blue, linen-covered box designed by art director Veronica Ditting to either hang on a wall or lay on a table. The interior of the box is lined with black paper, effectively framing the images. Large titles announce the talents in a graphic slab-serif font. Alternating with distinguished monthly calendar pages, each with an individual grid and layout. “All elements – Ethan's photography, the rhythm of and typography make for a dynamic Calendar.” Says Veronica Ditting.
In shooting Pirelli's 51st Cal, Green joins such photographic greats as Norman Parkinson, Terence Donovan, Helmut Newton, Bruce Weber, Annie Leibovitz, Paolo Roversi and Steven Meisel. “To be included in this group of legendary photographers who have shot the Calendar – many of whom inspired me to become a photographer – was huge,” says Green. “It felt like a stamp of approval.”
