Russell James Ten years behind the scenes of Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show

Erarta Museum presents an exhibition of an Australian photographer who collaborates with the magazines Vogue, American Photo, ELLE, GQ, Sports Illustrated. He owns world-famous portraits of Scarlett Johansson, Hillary and Bill Clinton, Halle Berry and Hugh Jackman. For more than 10 years, armed with a special permit and a camera, he freely penetrated the holy of holies of the world’s largest and most popular fashion show - Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show.

The unique artistic flair for which stars and eminent supermodels appreciate Russell James allowed him to create live pictures full of contagious inspiration and genuine passion inherent in the fashion industry. Visitors to the exhibition at the Erarta Museum can not only see the backstage of one of the most grandiose shows through the eyes of an Australian photographer, but also, plunged into the atmosphere of backstage, feel like part of it.

A series of 60 works presented at the exhibition invites viewers to the secret world - in it Victoria’s Secret “angels” descend to earth. The pictures are full of dynamics and genuine emotions: here is Candice Swanepoel peeking out from behind the curtains with an irresistible smile, Lady Gaga is worried before speaking on the stage of the show, and the brilliant Adriana Lima in curlers freely chatting with colleagues…

In the pictures of Russell James, we see girls in luxurious Victoria’s Secret lingerie and in home robes draped over the Fantasy Bra, decorated with precious stones. And if on the podium in the center of attention of the audience there are always toilet objects, the cost of which sometimes reaches tens of millions of dollars, then the main protagonist of James’s works is always a woman for whom these luxury goods are created. The author himself emphasizes that he primarily "photographed women for women." Over the years of working on the show, he repeatedly witnessed many touching scenes of support and mutual assistance: James often recalls how Gisele Oliveira and Karlie Kloss helped Min Xi after her fall in front of an audience of many thousands, or how the shocking diva Lady Gaga treated backstage patterns with your favorite cookies.

Russell James describes her work experience at Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show as follows: “I have repeatedly compared my unique backstage access to this amazing show with the work of a cleaner in the White House. I am constantly witnessing incredible historical events. However, in reality it is a story of personal relationships, mentoring and trust, the construction of which took many years and which I greatly value. Although what I’ve seen cannot be expressed in words, I hope that my photographs will allow you to get an idea of the amazing people and almost family relationships, thanks to which this bewitching show exists. I have always extremely appreciated the honor and trust shown to me. ”

About the photographer:

Russell James was born in 1962 in Australia into a working-class family. He currently lives and works in New York. Over the past two decades, the photographer’s photos have become synonymous with a non-standard and provocative look at many celebrities.

Russell James got his first job when he was 14 years old: he left school and got a job at a garbage can factory. Over the next decade, he tried his hand at a wide variety of professions: from a dog trainer to a police officer. According to him, all these skills were indispensable on the set.

However, Russell made the final choice of profession only in 1989, after meeting with the photographer Carlo Bosco. James recalls that the process of developing negatives completely captured his imagination - since then he could not think of anything except a photograph with which he decided to connect his life. It was this dream that brought the young man to New York.

For a long time, Russell James’s work went unnoticed until in 1997 he received an offer to remove Tyra Banks for the cover of Sports Illustrated. Filming with the American supermodel was a turning point in his career: leading fashion publications began to collaborate with the photographer. James has worked with many celebrities and models, such as Alessandra Ambrosio, Candice Swanepoel, Gisele Bündchen, Naomi Campbell, Adriana Lima, Heidi Klum, Angela Lindwall, Miranda Kerr, Behati Prinsloh and others. He owns popular portraits of famous people of the planet: Scarlet, Hillary and Bill Clinton, Halle Berry, Hugh Jackman, Rihanna, Faith Hill, members of The Black Eyed Peas and others.

For almost 20 years, the photographer worked closely with Victoria’s Secret brand. His works, glorifying the perfection of the female body, are unparalleled in popular culture. For 15 years, Russell James has been filming the backstage of the legendary Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show. The backstage secrets photo album released in 2017 saw the light not only in English, but also in Chinese.

In August 2007, James became the laureate of the prestigious Hasselblad Masters Award, and in 2009 took pride of place next to Irwin Penn and Helmut Newton in the list of resident artists of the Berlin gallery CAMERA WORK - a leading global platform specializing in modern photography and vintage photo classics. James’s series of art photographs has been exhibited in Tokyo, Berlin, Stockholm, Sydney, Aspen, Los Angeles and New York.