Back in 1980, David Sylvian of British band Japan was singing:
Gentlemen take polaroids
They fall in love they fall in love
Gentlemen take polaroids
They fall in love they fall in love
Sylvian wasn’t possibly alluding to Jeremy Kost — who was only a 4-year-old toddler at the time — but the degree of intimacy the New York-based artist conveys in his portraits of male models begs the question: how many times did he fall in love with one of his subjects?
Excerpts of his current body of work pop up regularly on Charmants.com — click here for the index of his most recent Objectifications. Boys, objectified but confident, undressing like they’re home alone, even when they are in a penthouse of the Maritime Hotel, like David Oliver [above], shooting with a renowned celebrity photographer.
Online ‘visual lab’ Contributing Editor features an overview of Jeremy Kost’s work (2001-2009) [above] in which he explains: “I think I might be the only person in New York who uses Manhunt to cast people — it’s not about getting laid. The whole idea was centered around this notion of objectification, kind of filtering people simply based on what they look like.”
But we learn nothing about the incredible chemistry he’s able to summon in every exposure. The inherent magic of the polaroid film is probably a contributing factor though — but the rest is a mystery, a bit like love itself we dare say.
The portrait of David Oliver (Red NYC) at the top of this story appeared in the first installment of Kost’s Male Gaze series for Hint magazine. Hit the gallery for the complete sunny, warm and totally abtastic series.
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