Cool Hunting

Photographer Alec Soth has been one busy guy lately. In addition to currently exhibiting work in six different galleries New York, England and France, he maintains his own very popular blog, has a new book set for release this fall (Dog Days Bogota) and last year he became an associate member of the renowned photography cooperative Magnum.

To add to this list of accomplishments, Magnum recently invited Soth to produce its third annual glossy Fashion Magazine called Paris Minnesota.

Using this opportunity as an excuse to play with fashion, Soth set out to combine images of noted fashion figures (such as Karl Lagerfeld and Sonia Rykiel) shot on location in Paris, with portraits of teenagers (some dressed by a stylist for the shoot) in his native Minnesota.

From Soth's description of the magazine: "I often say that when I am making a portrait, I'm not 'capturing' the other person. If the photograph documents anything, it is the space between the subject and myself. Something similar is at work with Fashion Magazine. I'm not really comfortable saying I know anything about Paris or its fashion world. And I suspect that most fashionable Parisians know just as little about Minnesota. What is interesting is the space between us. My favorite example of this involves Chanel. In Paris, I photographed Karl Lagerfeld at the Grand Palais. In Minnesota, I photographed a girl with a Chanel shopping bag in front of Sally's Beauty Shop. With this magazine, I'm trying to explore the distance between those two places."

The first two issues of the magazine were produced by Martin Parr and Bruce Gilden. Paris Minnesota is available for pre-order through Photoeye and is due out in August. See more images here.