Beautiful: Jay Diers | Vintage Revisited

SCROLLING THROUGH THE WORK OF JAY DIERS AND LOOKING AT THE FEATURES WE ALREADY DID WITH THE TALENTED PHOTOGRAPHER FROM CEDAR RAPIDS, IOWA, THERE IS, BESIDES HIS EXCELLENT CHOICE OF MEN, SOMETHING ELSE THAT IMMEDIATELY STANDS OUT. ALL OF JAY’S PHOTOGRAPHS HAVE THAT MOODY, NOSTALGIC LOOK. SOMETHING INJECTED BY HIS CHOICE OF COLOR AND USAGE OF DRAMATIC CONTRASTS AND SHADOW. SOMETHING THAT MAKES HIS WORK LOOK LIKE LITTLE GLANCES INTO A TIME LONG PAST.

We described Jay Diers’ work before as a mix of sensuality and sexuality in melancholic color schemes with an unmistakable erotic load. It has definitely become Jay’s signature style in photography, something clearly visible in his photo books A Night At The Hotel, Raw Youth and Midwest Refractions. Jay originated from Iowa and has specialized himself in shooting tall, burly and handsome young men as you can only find them in the Midwest of the United States. It is Jay’s wish to portray the Midwest as a unique place where one can find men doing farm chores during the day and going to a rave at night. A place that gives you the boy next door who scores the touchdown, dates the prom queen and is secretly in love with the quarterback. In all their youth and cheekiness, Jay’s men are impossible to resist.

Provocative, sexy and refreshing, Jay Diers takes us on a trip through time with his latest work in collaboration with newcomer Eric. Eric is an amateur model, slowly emerging as a real shining star in the business, and his work with Jay Diers is definitely a step in the right direction to stardom. When jay approached him with the idea of a beefcake inspired series, Eric was immediately ready to jump in and play the part. His toned body, his sexy boy-next-door look and his willingness to go beyond the expected, has made this series not only a set of erotic portraits. It goes much further than that. Using the right props, such as the sailors hat and the rugby ball, Jay and Eric have truly created a series of photographs that seems to have emerged from history. Real beefcake images that are both arousing and filling you with a longing to times long gone by.

19th century clergy man and social reformer Henry Ward Beecher once said that “every artist dips his brush in his own soul and paints his own nature in his pictures.” Studying Jay Diers' work it does not come as a surprise Jay embraced this believe and has unmistakably found a way to shoot both appealing portraits as very personal pictures, in a style that is his and his only. Describing his work Jay claims: “Photography is my life. I wake up everyday looking for the key to my art. The thing that makes it different than anybody else. Something that gives it a different voice.” Today Jay found that with Eric, revisiting the past. –BM-

JAY DIERS | BEAUTIFULMAG
JAEDEART STUDIOS | BEAUTIFULMAG