Unpublished Herb Ritts Photos Capture Essence of Sexual Revolution

Note | Nudity NOWNESS shares a set of breathtaking Herb Ritts images, ones so clearly full of relevant meaning and symbolism that I can just stop writing about the evolution of female bodies in the last two decades. Seven images that celebrate Herb Ritts’ images at an upcoming exhibition at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles, as well as a new book, sum up 40,000 words. 

Amazonian Cindy Crawford and Olympian Naomi Campbell feature alongside Johnny Depp, David Bowie and Karl Lagerfeld explain without words what Herb Ritts intentionally or subconsciously sought to communicate about men, women, sexuality and power in the years after the sexual revolution.

Ernest Becker’s ‘The Denial of Death’; the unleashing of female control over our own reproduction; the accumulation of feminine power and sensual, natural principles; female mythology pre-monotheism — the key psychological elements in all their glory and threatening metaphors stare at us in these images. Whew!

What a followup to the brain dump we did last night with Remi Rebillard’s newest editorial La Dolce Vita!! Comments on NOWNESS from industry heavy weights. Personally, I’ve had a visual jolt heavier than drinking five cups of espresso in five minutes.