Pandora

The photos for the Versace Catalogue Winter 1998 where made by Steven Meisel. All are dealing in a mysterious manner with mythological subjects. It’s not mentioned what characters Meisel had in mind when he arranged his photos. But this one reminds a lot of Pandora.

Pandora the curious girl with his box who brings all the evils to mankind as can be seen on this painting from 1894 by the British artist Henrietta Rae (1859-1928).

Fashionable Pin-Ups

Pin-ups had become fashionable. Since years photographers and designers discovered the nostalgic charm of that once despised artwork.

A very beautiful series was made by the photographer Bruno Dayan for Chantal Thomass.



Probably Dayan didn’t think in a special painter when he made his photos. But he wanted to imitate not only the costumes and poses but also the colors and the artificial surface.

It sounds good to me (1942) by David Wright (1912–1967)

Sleepy-Time Girl (1930s) by Gil Elvgren (1914-1980)

Catwoman

The modern "Carousel of Ideas" is moving and it’s not always easy to decide where icons, once put on in move, had their strongest impact.

For example Catwoman is a fictional comic book character associated the Batman comics. Catwoman first appears in Batman 1940. As a very popular character Catwoman has been featured in many media adaptations like other comic series, toys, television series and movies. Best known are the film with Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman in 1992 and that with Halle Berry in 2004.

In the May 2008 issue of US Vogue the photographer Craig McDean presented a series called “Daring Do” where the Canadian supermodel CoCo Rocha poses as Catwoman.

Ophelia

In the Dazed & Confused magazine appeared in December 2007 this Ophelia by the fashion photographer Mariano Vivanco.

I don’t think that Vivanco had a special painting in mind when he took this photo. But since the 19th century Ophelia is a popular icon in art. And because of this the images will resemble the most times as this painting may illustrate:

Ophelia (1876) by the French painter Antoine Auguste Ernest Hebert(1817-1908).

Coppertone Girl

The Italian fashion photographer Gian Paolo Tomasi has an inclination for new interpretations of artwork. That he isn’t only interested in the "big" art represented in the museums shows this example:


It’s a nice quotation of the "Coppertone Girl" from 1959, which was invented and done by Joyce Ballantyne (1918–2006) a well known painter of pin-up art.

Meisel - Tissot

In the May 2007 issue of American Vogue appeared a series by the fphotographer Steven Meisel called "Fashioning the Century".

This is one of the very well composed pictures (how Meisel used to do).


It reminds me of the painting "Lilacs" (c. 1875) by the French painter James Jacques Tissot (1836-1902). Maybe this wasn’t intended by Meisel. But anyway, it’s not only the similar pose and the flowers, it’s the same cool arrangement of luxury, the perfection of both pictures.

Transformers

The conjunctions between artwork and advertising have a lot of variations. A nice example is in my opinion the movie Transformers (2007), which was the result of the old Transformers toy advertising campaign.

After the success of the new movie these images where used by Citroën and Nissan for new advertising campaigns.