Without You
By Nicole Davis
This photograph, titled “Me Kissing Vinoodh (Passionately), 1999” is one of the most iconic images from the collective body of work created by the photographic team and couple Inez Van Lamswerde and Vinoodh Matadin, since they began working together in 1986.
The image starkly reveals that space we create for another when we allow a lover and a partner to enter our lives and even our physical body. The shadow of Vinoodh once he has been removed from the kiss – a physical equation of their union – leaves Inez truncated and somewhat severed. Of the image Inez has said, “Taking Vinoodh out of the kiss shows how destroyed I’d be.” Deep connection always carries within its shadow the fear of loss. There is a heroic beauty in the danger we tread and the risk we take to enter into relationship. Inez offers these words to explain the emotions embodied in the context of the image: “…devastating, mesmerizing, awesome, unexplainable, untouchable, painful, transporting, never enough…” The offering of self – body and soul – is both terrifying and transformative. The image of Inez – like a perceptual illusion – is either one of lack or metamorphosis depending on the eyes of the beholder.
Inez and Vinoodh met in 1983 while they were both attending Akadamie Vogue, a fashion school in their native Amsterdam. Since coming together to work on a collaborative project in 1986 they have created hundreds of fine art photographs and images for fashion magazines and ad campaigns. Throughout the years their work has remained integral to the dialog on contemporary fashion with a unique style that has reflected a raw, edgy, real and impassioned side of humanity.
As a couple Ines and Vinoodh remain strong. They still live and work together and are based primarily in New York with their son Charles Star Matadin.
This image is the first of a series of artworks we will be featuring throughout the Love Issue as we celebrate and highlight artists whose work adds a creative dimension to our ongoing journey into the topics surrounding Love. “Me Kissing Vinoodh (Passionately)”, has been in the Red Flag files since we launched in 2009 in anticipation of curating the image into the Love Issue. We featured it today to wish Inez and Vinoodh Happy Birthdays as Inez celebrated her’s on Sept 25th and Vinoodh today, Sept 29th. The second image is a self portrait of Inez and Vinoodh as a (complete) couple taken by them in their studio.