Rankin | VISUALLY HUNGRY | 22 March — 11 May 2008

Не is stunningly talented, elegantly provocative, nicely classic, charmingly paradoxical, sharply witted, very diversified and deservedly famous. His genius is boundless. Photographer, publisher, stage director
John Rankin Waddell, commonly known as simply Rankin,- an icon of contemporary photography. All his models are stars. Queen Elizabeth II, Tony Blair, Rolling Stones,U2,Arnold Schwarzenegger, Kristen Dunst and all who can be reckoned as political, music or fashion stars are among them . Rankin has created dozens of stars himself. In 1991 together with Jefferson Hack they launched “Dazed &Confused” magazine. The first issue was the unfolding black-and-white poster. But very soon the magazine turned into a bible for contemporary art,fashion, photography and music. Rankin’s energy and talent and Hack’s scent for young talents gave chance to many cult figures such as Damien Hirst, Jake and Dinos Chapman, Radiohead, Bjork, Alexander McQueen to make themselves known. Besides “Dazed&Confused” Rankin’s other projects are : digital TV “Dazed&Confused”, “Another Magazine” , “Rank” fashion magazine, “Vision On” publishing house ,specialized in books on photography, video commercials for Guinness, Rimmel, H&M, and also a full-length film “The Lives of the Saints” about how our desires are dangerous , and the consequences of their fulfillment are unpredictable . Every Rankin’s statement is always something unprecedented, shocking with its newness , originality of approach and freshness of look. “My goal is to fit into somewhere between the pure glossy beauty and ... “just have a look at this cellulite!”, in other words it’s important to preserve the feeling of living reality and bring it closer to the spectator. “Visually Hungry” is the project which gives a sort of a profile of Rankin’s creativity. It consists of many series : “Me,me,me” ( auto portraits for 20 years, sometimes reminding of Matthew Barney’s experiments), “Polaroids”, “Tuulitastic” ( pictures of his muse — model Tuuli), “Eyescapes” (photos of gigantic еуе pupils ), “Erotica”, “Snog” (dive into the nature of a kiss), “Sofa so sexy” ( satire on the contemporary photographers ), “Cats” (sexy girls as cats), “Portraits”, “Fashion”. Portrait is Rankin’s creative territory , even in fashion shoot where the living model usually is secondary, -

a portrait. Portrait challenging frame of the genre and stereotypes. It exposes Emotion, courage, sharp eye, excitement and the directors' hold of a true master! Go look! There’s no way to satisfy the visual hunger named Rankin !