Thomas Bourry's Lost Secrets, Vol 1: Fairy Tale

ONCE UPON A TIME, IN A FARAWAY LAND, A YOUNG PRINCE LIVED IN A SHINING CASTLE. ALTHOUGH HE HAD EVERYTHING HIS HEART DESIRED, THE PRINCE WAS SPOILED, SELFISH, AND UNKIND. BUT THEN, ONE WINTER'S NIGHT, AN OLD BEGGAR WOMAN CAME TO THE CASTLE AND OFFERED HIM A SINGLE ROSE IN RETURN FOR SHELTER FROM THE BITTER COLD. REPULSED BY HER HAGGARD APPEARANCE, THE PRINCE SNEERED AT THE GIFT AND TURNED THE OLD WOMAN AWAY. BUT SHE WARNED HIM NOT TO BE DECEIVED BY APPEARANCES, FOR BEAUTY IS FOUND WITHIN. AND WHEN HE DISMISSED HER AGAIN, THE OLD WOMAN'S UGLINESS MELTED AWAY TO REVEAL A BEAUTIFUL ENCHANTRESS.

There is something enchanting about the work of Thomas Bourry. This gifted photographer from Germany, who goes by the enigmatic name The Sphinx, has an uncanny talent to capture men in their most vulnerable state. Thomas’ portraits are never stand alones. They always come in complete series of multiple images, all capturing a short moment in a man’s private and most intimate life. A moment where all his defences are down and where he is completely exposed.

Thomas Bourry’s latest work is collected under the general name Lost Secrets. Each series carries the name of a fairy tale. By itself already a lost secret because aren’t the fairy tales the first ting we loose when we grow up? Not surprisingly the main theme of Thomas’ new work is once again the secret of male attraction and the promise of lust. And once again the short visual poems are a combination of flesh and soul. Each single frame is a mirror, exposing some hidden desire of your own dreams. Showing a man easy to identify yourself with.

Both Jungle Book and Beauty and the Beast are conceptual titles that reveal a intimacy in a man’s personality that is strangely familiar to look at. Jungle Book is an almost literary adventure, a moment where a man seeks comfort with himself and the soothing words of written masterpieces, curiously exciting and arousing. Beauty and the Beast portrays a whole different moment of ultimate privacy and intimacy, where the model explores his own pleasures with a camera, unleashing the beast within himself that only can be exposed to him and no one else. Thomas Bourry once again allows us to witness those secret desires and struggles.

When you really think about it, men are strange creatures. Always striving to be seen as strong fearless heroes, they cherish a seed of sensitivity and emotion within them. A secret truth they need to protect from prying eyes at all costs. Only at those rare moments when they feel entirely alone and comfortable, hidden from the view of the world, they are able to dive deep into that pool of secret feelings, shake off that mask of strong masculinity and give themselves completely to explore their innersoles. Only then they dare to be their true self. These are the moments in which they open themselves to their deepest desires. And to indulge in passion seems to be the only and best way to get over it. But the promise of sex does not always lead to satisfaction. –BM-

THOMAS BOURRY | BEAUTIFULMAG

Comments

[beaubrummell]

a truly masterpiece of poetic imagination
according to our own sensibility

[Jon-Lee Paul Butler]

His bear looks angry inside his pants.....