Warning: This post contains nudity.
Last night in Moscow saw the launch of the 2011
Pirelli Calendar. The world's most upscale pin-up calendar, given out to a few select clients of the tyre brand, the annual release has become an institution and aims to capture the zeitgeist each year through its use of creative super stars and the most beautiful models in the world.
This year's 'Mythology' shoot saw Julianne Moore (who has also gone naked for Bvlgari recently) posing as Hera, wife of Zeus along with star models Bianca Balti, Elisa Sednaoui, Freja Beha Erichsen, Isabeli Fontana, Magdalena Frackowiak , Anja Rubik, Abbey Lee Kershaw , Lakshmi Menon, Heidi Mount (Aurora, Amphitrite), Erin Wasson, Natasha Poly, Daria Werbowy, Iris Strubegger, Sebastien Jondeau, Garret Neff, and Jake Davis posing in Lagerfeld's personal studio. The genetically gifted specimens all posed for Karl as Greek and Roman gods - a reasonable proposition given they are, for the most part, later day Adonis and Aphrodites.
Lagerfeld's take on the calendar couldn't be more different from
last year's effort by Terry Richardson. While Richardson shot Pirelli in his usual style, raw, gritty and literally dripping with sexual innuendo, Lagerfeld has gone for high polish, shooting in black and white, with dramatic lighting and intense retouching that makes his subjects look as if they might just be carved of marble. While the result is perhaps less titillating than Richardson's work, it's no less beautiful. This pure, high polish approach does exactly what you want from a sexy calendar - it shows that some humans can be gorgeous to the point of godliness.
Via
High Snobriety and
The Cut