Snow Angels and Dreams

Happy Friday...

... And Happy Holidays everyone. X

Illustrator Simon Massey Di Vallazza

Another Illustrator, this time Simon Massey Di Vallazza has referenced a few of my photos in his work.

American Eagle Times Square Launch

It's great to my Aerie (American Eagle intimates) Holiday '09 campaign photos lit up and on this kind of scale. This picture shows the front of the new American Eagle flag ship store in Times Square, New York. It's a 4 floor, 25,000-square-foot monster of a place.

Last night was the launch party for the new store. Guests included most of the cast of 'Gossip Girl' including Leighton Meester performing her new single.

Matt Richards illustrator

It was nice to hear that illustrator Matt Richards used one of my photos as inspiration for a piece of work. Thanks for asking permission Matt. The work is a reminder of warmer days gone by, roll on next Summer I say!

I love The Catskills

Only in the Catskills.......

Happy Hackney Halloween 2009

benna.co.uk Autumn Winter lookbook

New pictures of mine in the Autumn/ Winter look book for lovely accessories web shop benna.co.uk.

Carharrt Detroit exhibition

This weekend Carhartt invited me to Munich for the launch of my photo exhibition in their new store. They are exhibiting my photos from Detroit.

It's an impressive space and the pictures looked great. If you find yourself in Munich take a break from the beer festival and have a look.

Photos above by Nuri Rashid.

Mia again

Remember Mia from one of my first posts on the blog? I first met her whilst casting at the Victoria Park underage festival. She's been helping me out during her school holidays. She loves the idea of trying modeling so I snapped some more pics of her on one of my shoots and we went to see some agencies. She is now on the books as a major model agency, the same one as Kate Moss no less! Needless to say she is very excited.

She's a smart girl who knows that modeling is rarely a career for life, so she'll still finish all her education and hopefully just have some fun with it. Good luck Mia. x x

Mary Blair

Last weekend in Hay-On-Wye in Wales I was lucky enough to find 'My First Sing-A-Song Book' from 1966 to add to my collection of books illustrated by Mary Blair.

One of my favorite artists this brilliant painter, concept artist, and stylist was one of the first women to reach great heights of influence within the Disney company, in the 1940's and 50's. Her expressive use of colors and forms can be seen in several Disney films, and her work continues to inspire artists and animators to this day. Her work can be seen in Disney's Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, and DisneyWorld's It's a Small World attraction. Beyond Disney, you can see her work in several Little Golden Books from the period. There is also some more examples of her work on this Flickr set

California Girls

Summer is here and so are my snaps of real life Valley Girls Natalia and Sam. Natalia is my assistant Alex's sister and Sam her best friend. These photos were shot in some downtime after an American Eagle shoot in and around their home turf, Universal City in Los Angeles.

Treasure Box still

 

Just found this still from the film. The lovely Cecille x

Treasure Box

I hope you like the short film I shot for my exhibition. It was lovingly shot on Super 8 film and was projected on the back wall in The Old Shoreditch Station. 

Thanks to the talented team who worked on it with me, Polly Banks styling, Liz Daxauer Hair and Make-up, Sarah May set design, Alex on lighting and starring the beautiful Cecile at Union models. 

Also special thanks to Castle Gibson for the use of their location, and Alex Lindsay who in a fortunate chance meeting made it all possible by lending me his camera

Rats !

We had a lot of fun on the set of this shoot. Brian the rat was on his best behavior and the beautiful Ellen Danes was such a good sport for putting up with having him crawl all over her all day for the photos. Here he is trying to escape after giving us a tune on the piano. See the whole shoot here. 

Neil Krug

Truly inspiring imagery by promo director by Neil Krug. Read about him in an interview on Fecal Face. We salute you Neil. 

Alejandra Quesada

In January this year I was lucky enough to be invited to Mexico City to stay with designer Alejandra Quesada. After discovering a mutual appreciation of each others work, she asked me to shoot her latest collection . The trip was a great success, I shot several stories, including portraits of new Mexican talent for i-D magazine. I also got to avoid the winter blues for a few weeks and made a great new friend. 

We bought all these amazing creatures in the local craft markets, and used them in the shoot. I now have some living in my house as a reminder of a great trip. Mexico is a truly inspiring and colourful place, now I just have to go back for Day of the Dead. 

Thanks for everything Ale xxx

You can see the shoot under the 'advertising' section of my site. 

benna.co.uk

New accessories website benna.co.uk is now on-line. It features photos by yours truly, as interactive poloroids that you can move around yourself. Her charm necklaces by Annina Vogel are particularly cute.