Perfect Pairing: Francois Nars + Tahiti
© François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
© François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
© François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
© François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
© François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
© François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
© François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
© François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
© François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
© Faery Lands, Tahiti by François Nars, Rizzoli New York, 2013
Photo courtesy of NARS Cosmetics
As snow falls in the Sierras and frozen flakes blanket Western ski resorts, sun lovers find themselves wistfully dreaming of the South Pacific. François Nars, founder and creative director of the cosmetics line that bears his name, found himself similarly drawn to an island off the coast of Bora Bora after several trips to French Polynesia. The visits inspired him to buy Motu Tané, a small island near Tahiti, and Nars spent the past 10 years photographing the landscape and people of the region. Now he’s compiled the images in a lush new tome, Faery Lands, Tahiti (Rizzoli), that’s hit bookstores just as the temperatures drop this holiday season.
The book holds the first published collection of Nars’ personal photographs, and the images are both intimate and powerful. “This is very different from what I’ve done so far,” says Nars, noting that the volume contains images of island inhabitants wearing very little makeup. Nars shoots all of his beauty campaigns featuring models wearing the latest color palette for each season, so the images of fishermen and palm fronds are a stark departure for him. These new images have a more spontaneous quality, but each photo is just as carefully composed as the shots accompanying his makeup collections. “This is still my vision of beauty,” he says. The entire book is made up of black and white photographs styled and lit by Nars, who captured each shot with a large format camera. “It took me 10 years to do this, I would go for a month each year and shoot. People age from the first images to the last ones I took.” The combined prints evoke a lengthy expedition to a mysterious island. “It’s very National Geographic, says Nars. “The angles, the light, the approach, I used a lot of film.” The world he’s created is so immersive, that readers will find themselves dreaming of boat rides and bikinis rather than ski chalets and parkas.
By Elizabeth Varnell
Pictured: An image from Faery Lands, Tahiti by François Nars.
Photo Credit: © François Nars, Faery Lands, Tahiti Rizzoli, 2013
