Inside Saint Laurent’s Erotically-Charged Lin Zhipeng Exhibition

Lin Zhipeng (also called No.223, after the lovesick policeman in Wong Kar-wai’s Chungking Categorical) has been documenting China’s counterculture for years. By means of sensual portraits and suggestive nonetheless lifes, the Beijing-based photographer paints a young image of the younger folks he observes, and their lives appear to unfurl in entrance of his lens: moments of melancholy give strategy to intense pleasure; a tradition of playful sexuality is ready in opposition to a conservative political backdrop; relationships type and collapse.

“Time can rework us as rapidly as it will probably strengthen or tarnish our social relationships,” No.223 instructed AnOther final yr. “For this reason I’ve been taking pictures my greatest buddies for years. Each time I see them, I take their {photograph} once more. I want to do that till we die, merely to specific the passage of time.”

This neighborhood of buddies and lovers is on the centre of No.223’s new exhibition, the newest cultural expertise curated by Anthony Vaccarello for Saint Laurent’s Rive Droite shops in Paris and Los Angeles. Capturing their stressed spirit, the exhibition spans a number of years – that includes works from 2016 to 2019 – and a good broader geographical unfold, with the photographer curating intimate recollections from his time in China, Tibet, Southeast Asia, Japan, and Europe.

Among the many ensuing photographs, that are additionally showcased in an accompanying fanzine, are humorous nudes that includes doves and pineapples – only one instance of the wealthy flora discovered all through No.223’s work – snapshots from steamy membership nights, and intimate portrayals of the physique that flip his topics’ pores and skin right into a canvas for ink and shadows. The present isn’t all about baring flesh, although. Extra nature turns up in images of phallic flower blossoms and scooped-out fruit (OK, in order that they’re nonetheless fairly provocative) and intercourse is approached from a extra indirect angle in photographs of discarded swimming shorts and bottles of Durex.

The erotic cost of No.223’s work is well-trodden floor for the Rive Droite shops. Taking their identify from Saint Laurent’s rive gauche line that helped democratise trend again within the 60s, the retail-slash-exhibition areas are conceptualised by Vaccarello and have beforehand performed host to the likes of voyeuristic photographer Henrik Purienne, in addition to a wide range of musicians through its “Stay Classes” collection.

Check out the works featured in Lin Zhipeng’s present Rive Droite exhibition, working solely in Paris and Los Angeles, within the gallery above.