Sylvie Blum

There are many multi-talented individuals in the art world: authors who take incredible photographs, actors who are extraordinary directors. There are doctors and architects who become acclaimed writers, and poets who create cinematographic masterpieces. But it is rarely heard that a model has notably excelled in artistry.

Sylvie Blum (*1967 in Taxenbach Austria) is the exception. She learned her photographic technique from her husband, the erotic photographer Günter Blum. From his death onwards, she went about changing her perspective by standing behind the camera. Her first published attempt was an ambitious series of self-portraits featuring the narcissistic title “Venus selbst (Venus herself).” It was a kind of self-observation before entering into dialogue with other models. Thereafter she threw herself into a relished obsession and experimented with models, styles, light and space.

In 1998, fascinated by artistic nudes, as they were so perfectly presented in the 1930’s by photographic legends such as George Hoyningen-Huene or Horst P. Horst, Sylvie Blum started creating body fragments, photographic torsos that attain an almost sculptural impression in the artistic lighting and delicate gradation of gray tones. However, the sources of her inspiration are far more varied. Photographs from her bewitching photo series Nudes, which revealed the spectrum of her work, emerged out of Miami, Berlin, Los Angeles and Mallorca.

Whether on the trail of Bruce Weber, Leni Riefenstahl or Herbert List, her images all have something in common. Sylvie Blum gives them something modern and perfects the fine art of the erotic with the utmost aesthetic quality. In a few years, advanced by her exceptional biography, she has found her spot in contemporary photography. “When you think erotica, do you think Sylvie Blum?” asks British Maxim, followed immediately by the answer. “Ol’ Auntie Sylvie is the Ansel Adams of the nude female form.”