600 photos of handbags by Juergen Teller: the monster exhibition of an obsessive artist
A subversive and offbeat photographer, between provocation and poetry
The photograph of Juergen Teller continues to surprise with his wealth and his eclecticism, and as proof: more than 20 years after the start of his career, we still manage to reread his work from a new angle.While in 2016, the artist devoted an entire series to the plates, his passion for football at the past year given to an exhibition entirely dedicated to this theme in Moscow.His offbeat and sometimes subversive work, between provocation and poetry, had quickly attracted fashion: a seated photographer for Marc Jacobs campaigns for years, he is also famous for having taken many photographs for Céline, Louis Vuitton or Adidas.Her friend Vivienne Westwood regularly entrusted her with the visual direction of her brand and poses as a model of her images, testifying to the strong link that unites them.However, Juergen Teller has never limited himself to fashion photography.In this new personal exhibition at Villa Pignatelli, here is that another main character appears in his work: the handbag, brand or counterfeiting (Juergen Teller never being afraid of provocation), a theme that camein the mind of the photographer while he was walking in the streets of Paris.
In the leitmotif of the exhibition, the handbag leads us from the grotesque to the pathetic, passing through the pure aesthetics of fashion and the triviality of everyday life.
Because at Juergen Teller's, this bag lends itself to all roles, situations or even registers: in the 600 photographs selected by the artist and the curators of the exhibition Mario Codognato and Adriana Rispoli, he sometimes wants to be a whimsical object,sometimes glamorous accessory, sometimes symptom of a disturbing social reality.In the leitmotif of the exhibition, he therefore leads us from the grotesque to the pathetic via the pure aesthetics of fashion and the triviality of everyday life.Furthermore, presenting this theme in Naples is also for Juergen Teller a way to pay tribute to the place of the bag in Italian culture.Emblematic witness of a national tradition of leather goods and leather making, it recalls the importance of know-how in the fashion industry.
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