Such costumes represents escaping society’s consumerist constraints for a more tranquil and sublime existence, the return to a happy age of innocence and freedom.īy viewing his oeuvre in its entirety, what emerges is a picture of a coming-of-age for humanity: beings in transition from one century to another, a society moving away from the wars of the 20th century and towards one which, at the time, seemed more hopeful. To McBride, clothes are a metaphor for our commercial culture – garments identifying both our place in society and our era in history. There is a sensual link between the fabric of their clothes, the placement and proximity of their bodies, the textures which surround them and the elements of nature which are used to construct this fantasy. What we see in McBride’s photographs are the subjects being placed imaginatively and emotionally in a world of their own. Although born in St Louis, Missouri, in 1955 he eventually settled permanently in Germany, a country he had originally visited while serving with the United States Army. McBride himself saw his images in many ways as a moral response to a country that was re-thinking its position after the second world war. When one really looks and digests their careful, energetic beauty, one wonders if this is due to tacit assumption rather than a deliberate intent of the artist.Įver since its invention, photography has been seen as a commentary on and a documentation of social change: images chosen with moral sense and conscience. Kennedy, Romy Schneider, Willy Brandt and Konrad Adenauer, plus sculpture, painting and book illustration – McBride’s work is etched in the subconscious for its fierce ambiguity, which resulted in his photographs of nudes being rejected in the United States. Rather than for the scope of its subjects – such as photographic portraits of John F. The opening quote from Will McBride’s website, reprinted right, conveys the feeling which seems to float tenderly from his images. Titles Include: Barbara Smoking, Munich, 1963 Street Scene in New York, 1976 Full House, for Twen, Munich, 1970 Uli in the Leonardo-Da-Vinci Circle, Casoli, 1978 Bernauer Strasse, Berlin, 1961 Girl in the Excavator Shovel, Frankfurt, 1997 Michael and Cathy, Les Baux, 1975 Barbara in Bed, Berlin, 1959 The Embrace, Munich, 1964 Barbara Pregnant, for Twen, Berlin, 1960 Hand with Two Stones, 1972 Uli, Casoli, 1978 Mike in the Shower, Salem, 1963 Boy with Dog, 1957 Konrad Adenauer, Berlin, 1965

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