Chromogenic print, framed 40 x 30 cm (15.7 x 11.8 in)
Signed and numbered by the photographer in ink on the reverse, edition no. 3/17
PROVENANCE directly from the photographer
LITERATURE Paolo Roversi, London 2011, pl. 50; „Terrible Beauty“ in: Prestige, Hongkong 2012, September 1.

Born and raised in Ravenna in northern Italy, Paolo Roversi moved to Paris in the early 1970s, following advice from Peter Knapp, who was art director of Elle at the time, and he has lived there ever since. In Paris, Roversi discovered haute couture and began his career as an assistant to the fashion photographer Laurence Sackmann. Subsequently he shot campaigns for Comme des Garçons, Christian Dior and Yves Saint Laurent and worked for all the great fashion magazines, including Harper’s Bazaar, I-D, The New York Times Magazine and especially the Italian Vogue.
The present photograph shows the American model Kristen McMenamy (b. 1966) who became known for her striking androgynous look during the 1980s and 1990s. Here, she is wearing a bright red coat by the designer Jean Paul Gaultier. Seated and striking a superior attitude, cigarette in hand, the model seems suspended above the cobblestone pavement. The photo has a mysterious and secretive aura, not least because of its unique use of light. The photographer himself said that light was the most important element of his work.
It is especially his technique of “painting with light”, for which he illuminates the model sitting in darkness with one single source of light, which places Roversi’s works somewhere between documentary interest and a more impressionistic attitude.