Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin Unveil New Works in Paris

BLOWING KISSES: Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin will be celebrating 40 years in photography next year with a big retrospective at Kunstmuseum The Hague, spanning some 150 photos, plus video works.

But on Thursday, the Dutch duo took advantage of the Paris Photo fair to provide a preview of the upcoming exhibition at interior designer India Mahdavi’s Project Room.

Their new works, shot in Marfa, Texas, on the new iPhone 17, spotlights another artistic couple: their son Charles Matadin and his partner Natalie Brumley, who share a kiss under a red veil in one dramatic image, echoing their emblematic 1999 image “Me Kissing Vinoodh.”

According to the duo, the iPhone has been a game changer because of its immediacy, married to high photographic quality.

“It’s unbelievable. I mean, no tripods, no camera bag,” van Lamsweerde related. “But then also, the quality is insane.

“We were dealing with backlight, red fabric over her face, movements, big distances, all the stuff that for a camera is super hard. We didn’t think about it, but the phone actually was the ideal tool for it.”

Naturally, she chose the iPhone 17 in orange, the national color of The Netherlands, pulling it out of her coat pocket as proof.

The duo has already used the iPhone for major commissions, including the giant floral projections at Chanel’s spring 2024 ready-to-wear fashion show in Paris.

Mahdavi picked up all the symbolism in the new kiss photo: The heart-like shape of the veil, draped over the couple’s heads, and the undulating road stretching off into infinity behind them.

“It’s just so beautiful and quite different from what they do usually,” she said. “It’s fashion, but it’s not fashion at the same time. It’s artistic work.”

“Can Love Be a Photograph” is the title of the upcoming show in The Hague. The images on display in Paris were originally conceived for a traveling show titled “Joy in 3 Parts,” curated by Kathy Ryan.