CThru.com Presents Tony Ward

Self Portrait With Handlebar Mustache

TW: When did you first realize you had a distinct eye for mens fashion?

KS: It began In High school, I was an Art Major, painter and sculptor. I wore black clothing covered in Gesso on purpose, very Jackson Pollock.

TW: Did the way your father dress for work and casual time impact your early view as to how men should approach the way they attire themselves?

KS: Yes my father dressed very well, he was a white collar man. This was the 70’s you had to look fly even for work. He also dressed for evening, Tux all the way. He is a 33 degree Mason so he had to come correct. He wore a wide variety of hats and cologne that made my eyes water, but he was always well groomed. He’s still a fly cat. Smooth like china silk. I love him for that.

Mississippi At the Crossroads: Photo By Kwaku Alston

TW: Who is your favorite menswear designer today?

KS: I like a bit of every one. I take designer sport coats and cut them below the pockets to crop the front of the jacket. I’ve just finished a Paul Smith sport coat. I’ll rock that today with Pink shoes. I’d also like to add, I only wear ROGER CHARLES NEW YORK, the shirt company I started with a partner in 2007.

TW: We met during the glory days at VIBE during the early 90’s…. How did your tenure there impact your approach to mens fashion as you moved forward with your career as fashion director for several other popular culture magazines, including DETAILS and GEAR?

KS: VIBE was my first real taste of artistic freedom. I could choose my calibrator’s like you my friend. We could test the boundaries of traditional American publishing, go on location and show beautiful nudes. The work was seamless in the context of VIBE. It allowed me to dream and make pictures I wanted to see in a magazine.

Mississippi: Photo By Kwaku Alston

TW: We have both shared the experience of working for the famous Guccione family. I for the father Bob senior. and you for the son Bob junior. What was it like to work for the son of the founder and publisher of Penthouse magazine?

KS: Bob junior is a true original thinker and thoughtful man. A great human being. I was lucky to be in his company and at all times I love him very much. When he writes his memoirs I’ll be first in line to buy the book. He has his place in the American history of publishing. SPIN Magazine stood alone as the voice of the late 70’s and early 80’s. It covered bands that couldn’t get arrested at the time. I could go on forever about Bob. I learned how to bring a product to market, communicate the vision and sell it to marketers. He had a great deal to do with who I am today.

TW: You are currently fashion director for ESPN the magazine. What is the most interesting fashion editorial you have published thus far?

KS: Every year we do a shoot called Kings For a Day. It features up and coming NFL Draft players. Young guys who enjoy the work I do. The other amazing shoot was with the Washington Capital Police posing as Secret Service agents protecting the President. It involved blue screen and great gray suits.

Photo By Albert Watson

Photo By Jody Ake

TW: What is your favorite mens fragrance?
KS: Tough one I have a very bad nose, due to years of allergies. I have worn Calvin Klein Obsession. I think I drained the bottle and never got a refill.
I may start to wear ODIN 04 as it is clean, light and natural.

Self Portrait With Beard

1958 Chrysler 300D

……Like many of the objects Michael Furman has photographed over the years, photographing automobiles has become a symbol of his perfectionism and unrelenting attention to light and detail. The vision he has created over 30 years has placed him atop the world’s best car photographers.

He has worked and collaborated with many blue chip automotive companies that include; Mercedes Benz, Jaguar, BMW and General Motors to name a few. He has also photographed the Ralph Lauren automobile collection as part of an exhibition and book entitled, Speed, Style and Beauty, the Cars of the Ralph Lauren Collection, courtesy of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and recently was interviewed by another famous car aficionado, Jay Leno.

TW recently contacted Mr. Furman to ask him a few questions about his successful career.

1933 Alfa Romeo 8C 2300 Monza

MICHAEL FURMAN INTERVIEW

TW: You are nationally known as a master of photographing inanimate objects for many years. What made you turn your attention specifically to motor vehicles?

MF: About 10 years into my pro career, I felt the need to specialize, and to do so with a subject that I always appreciated. In fact, I first picked up a camera as a young boy to photograph a car.

2. What is the most unique or rare car you have ever photographed?

Many of the cars we shoot are famous or one-of-a-kind. This past summer we shot one of the six Bugatti Royales while it was in California.

3. You are obviously passionate about your love for photographing cars. Is passion the key to your success?

My great passion is for light. and my subject is cars. I find the cars and their histories fascinating. Being passionate is critical to being successful at anything.

1963 Corvette Split Window Coupe

4. Do you have any interest in photographing vehicles in motion?

Not really, I have a hard enough time capturing them when they are static in the studio.

5. Do you think GM will regain its global leadership in the production of motor vehicles in 2010?

I think GM will return as a much better company, producing much better cars. It will probably take longer than just one year. They have a lot of work to do.

6. If money wasn’t a factor which car would you drive daily?

Porsche

1951 Hudson Hornet

7. Which part on a car do you think was the most inventive post 1970s?

The addition of computers. It has allowed for extraordinary improvements in efficiency, safety and features.

8. Which car is Michael Furman driving these days for fun?

My Mini Cooper S.

9. What advice can you offer the student of photography on how to earn a living as a professional, like the Michael Furman’s of the world?

Be very dedicated to your craft. Do not accept “good enough” as your standard. Never be satisfied, and always realize that you could do better.

1941 Lincoln Continental Convertible

10. What is the most difficult task in photographing a car to meet your standards of creating a perfect image?

The control of the space in which we are shooting. The car is highly reflective, and therefore shows everything in the studio. Managing that problem is the only way to achieve quality work.

1957 Ferrari 625/250 TRC

….To learn more about Michael’s work, log on to www.MichaelFurman.com….

Post by Corey Armpriester

Amsterdam and Philly and Computerland

CA-Amsterdam seems just right for you on many levels; think about the Tulip and two lips being the vaginal lips. Have you ever thought about doing an erotic shoot in a field of Tulips or is that redundant?
TW- It’s actually a wonderful idea, I would be very compelled by something like that, and now that you gave me the idea, you may see that picture in the near future.

CA-Do you have a favorite Philadelphia artist?
TW-Hands down George Krause, he was one of my early mentors in the ’70s and after meeting him I invited him to Rochester to lecture when I was studying at the Rochester Institute of Technology, and he stayed as a guest in my home for a weekend which was unbelievable for a 24-year-old photography student. Even these days when I look at his work, it remains top shelf.

CA-Are you enthusiastic about art or photography?
TW-I feel enthusiastic about digital media, the internet, specifically blogs. I think that is where artists should move their work forward, by creating their own community around the work.

CA-I’ve been to your blog and it feels like an explosion of yes.
TW-I appreciate that because for the first time in several years I feel like my creativity has been invigorated. Whenever you go through personal struggles like a divorce or illness or death in the family, it’s very draining on the creative process. I’ve catapulted all of my energies into a daily commitment to the blog. I encourage any artist young or old, if you don’t have a blog or a website or email address to get those things so you can become part of the digital world.

CA-Is there any way of escaping that?
TW-No, it’s like if you need glasses. It’s part of the process now.

CA- You see it as an empowering tool?
TW-Absolutely, you become your own publisher.

CA-Empowerment through electronic media?
TW-One hundred percent. I’ll take it a step further; I think galleries as a vehicle to show work these days is passé.

CA-Really!
TW-Yes, the frontier for showing uninhibited work is on the internet.

CA-How do you balance reaching for the stars and accepting reality as it exist?
TW-There is no balance. The artist must have an unwavering commitment to what they believe in and must maintain this unique position.

CA-Do you mentor artists?
TW- I’m constantly mentoring artists.

CA-What is it about human sexuality that makes you seek it out and explore it? What happened in your childhood?
TW-It’s what happened when I studied art history. I saw a lot of great things–I saw great painting and great ancient art, great sculpture, and then I started to see a lot of photography and when I looked at all of that work I said, you know what’s lacking in this great canon of art that I studied? Where’s the human sexuality? That was lacking in my view of art history.

CA-Do you think it was cleverly disguised?
TW-It was disguised in allegorical paintings but hard core sexuality, which is part of human existence, was never seriously addressed.

CA-Does the name Pindar mean anything to you?
TW-No, I don’t know Pindar. What is it?

Tony And Tony

CA- You have a photograph on your website that is a portrait of you and Tony Ward (model/actor/artist) you’re both wearing sexy short shorts and slogan t-shirts that say “I am Tony Ward” (I am=God, esoteric symbol) and Tony Ward (model) is feeding you something that looks like a cigar and you’re blowing smoke out of your nose while the other Tony Ward is touching his penis. This trinity of symbols made me think of Pindar, the golden penis of the dragon/lizard that lives in the South of France. Are you familiar with this myth and legend?

TW-It’s interesting you bring up mythology and the esoteric; I have heard these kinds of connections to my work before. People may not know but I meditate twice a day. Who knows, maybe just a subliminal thing. On a practical side, the way that t-shirt came about was Helmut Newton’s former stylist Sascha Lilic saw my book Orgasm in a book store in Europe. He was creative director of Spoon magazine at the time and sent a message to his editor in New York to contact me about us working together. I thought he was looking for Tony Ward the model. So I contacted Sascha and suggested we do a shoot with Tony Ward. Tony Ward shoots Tony Ward (the model) and Sascha loved it. We met in LA to produce the shoot where Tony resides and that’s really how that photograph came about.

CA-You seem to be more and more involved in the world of celebrity. Is there anything about that world that frightens you?
TW-The more famous you are the less autonomy you have.

Actress Thandie Newton

Post by Corey Armpriester

CA-Can an artist be successful without an agent or gallery representation?
TW-That’s a problem with the art scene over the past 10 to 20 years. The galleries and the collectors became the power brokers in the art world instead of the artists and the artist almost became secondary to the art. You don’t need a big name gallery a big name museum or a big name collector verifying your importance; that is something you have to establish yourself and that is what will draw your audience, not the other way around.

CA-Why do you live in Philadelphia?
TW-This is where I was born and raised and I have family here and I’m a very family oriented person, Philly is home.

Family, assistants

CA-Do you think having a family hinders the artist in any way as far as resources and time that can be given to the work?
TW-No question, that was one of the hard things about my marriage and raising a family. It’s always an underlying drive, the work comes first. Any artist of merit will say the Art comes first.

CA-How does your family deal with that and what is the consequence?
TW-The consequence in my case is divorce. Unfortunately my 23 years of marriage to my wife Sandy has started to unravel through divorce proceedings. It’s an unfortunate circumstance.

CA-Do you ever allow the assistant to take the photograph?
TW-No, my assistants generally take care of my post production needs and they also help me on the actual shoot, but I never give them the responsibility of taking the shot and then me putting my name to it; that would never happen.

CA-Is there something unethical about that?
TW-No, Andy Warhol had the factory; it’s really up to the individual artist to decide.

CA-Do you practice sex magic?
TW-I’m not gonna get into my personal sex life.

CA-What? Tony Ward is afraid to talk about sex!?
TW-I’m not afraid to talk about sex. I think there’s a thing called love and I think there’s a thing called sex and the two are not necessarily the same; does that answer your question?
CA-Yes.

CA-Is the Muse necessary?
TW-The Muse is like having coffee in the morning.

CA-Is feminism contributing to the destruction of the family?
TW-No, I don’t think feminism is the thing that destroys families, there’s a lack of a long term commitment.
CA-People will be surprised that Tony Ward is coming to the defense of feminism; that’s very bizarre.
TW-I’m not committed to the idea of feminism. Who am I to say a feminist viewpoint is right or wrong. What I prefer to do is through my work ask more questions about a variety of cultural issues.

CA-Is photography stupid?
TW-Photography is simple, not stupid; even with all the cameras out there people still take very mundane pictures that don’t need to proliferate the planet. In the proper hands, it’s really a rewarding medium.

CA-Could you talk about light?
TW-There’s no such thing as good light or bad light

CA-Artificial and natural light are equal?
TW-There’s no mandate from the art gods indicating what type of light one should work with.

CA-Amsterdam is
TW-My second home.

CA-Do you have a favorite coffee shop and do you eat Space Cakes?
TW-No, no Space Cakes for me. I know too many Dutch friends that have carted Americans off to hospitals because of those space cakes.

CA-One Space Cake is not going to send you to the hospital.
TW-I know that Mick Jagger has been taken back to the hotel on occasion.

Part 3 of the interview will be posted tomorrow…..

……
Post by Corey Armpriester

With art, cigarettes and sex on my mind, I sit down with Philadelphia’s very own agent provocateur, photographer Tony Ward, for a little talk, revealing a man with drive and ambitions fueled by art and costing him his marriage. Art as home wrecker–I’m sure spouses of artists can understand such a thing.

The Philadelphia photographer’s work runs the gamut from high art to low, from gallery exhibits to Bob Guccione and Penthouse Magazine. Sitting across the table from Tony Ward, I get the impression he has the confidence of a man whose ancestors follow him around everywhere he goes, except during moments of silence, his eyes share a melancholy and introspection he tightly controls; I suspect this recipe is a powerful source of seduction (the emotional tease).

If you’re an artist and have ever fantasized about traveling and exhibiting your work in galleries around the world, selling your art for thousands of dollars and having it stored in international museum collections while working on your sixth book in-between, and working on a constant stream of magazine spreads, then Tony Ward is living out your dreams in his life. How did that happen? What does it take to get that far? He talks about art patronage, feminism, space cakes, Thandie Newton and agents re-emerging to assist him in making the right introductions. He gives both the carnage and inspiration of art life, yearning for itself.

Ward will be showing some of his work at The University of Pennsylvania’s Fox Gallery, Feb. 17 to March 5, 2010.
Corey Armpriester-Germany has been very good to you, what is your relationship to the German people?
Tony Ward-It’s so true that Germany was a spring board for me. What happened was my agent in New York was Henrietta Brackman; she came out of retirement to represent me. Henrietta introduced me to Ursula Kreis, another well known New York agent who introduced me to the right people at the right time, which resulted in my having shows in Hamburg, Berlin and other German cities.

CA-Are you surprised that your photograph titled, “The Figure” sold for $18,000?
TW-I wasn’t really that surprised, only because I think it’s one of my best works; a gallery in Paris decided to invest in a print that warrants that kind of price, and a collector I met at the opening bought the piece.

The patron

CA-How important was Bob Guccione to your career? (Guccione is founder and once publisher of Penthouse magazine).
TW-Bob Guccione was pivotal because during 1995, I was producing a lot of free work, work for myself, and I was getting into a very creative zone. A friend of mine that had worked along side of Bob in the ’80s suggested I send Bob a portfolio. I sent a set of prints to his house on 16 East 67th Street in NYC; after he saw those prints he decided to feature me in the September 1996 Anniversary Issue, 16 pages that launched my career in the adult print industry. He was my patron of the arts for almost 10 years; I had an open checkbook to produce as much material as he could publish for many years. That’s what enabled me to travel to Europe so much.

CA-Do you think the grain in your photographs distinguishes your work from pornography?
TW-There’s certainly artifice built into the structure of my work to try and avoid the stigma of being labeled a pornographer, because the facts are that I was engaged in these kinds of shoots really looking for a means to express the art of it not the sex of it.

CA-Do you think the grain gets in the way of using the images as a masturbatory aid?
TW-I never considered my images to be masturbatory at all. In fact someone came up to me once and said, “Tony I find your images masturbatory”; I was almost insulted or repulsed, that was the consequence of some of the work.

CA-Why is the strap-on so important?
TW-That was just a visual tool we used; it was one of the protocols, especially when shooting lesbian scenes.

CA-Using one word, describe the vagina.
TW-Flower

CA-Is branding your name a dehumanizing act?
TW-No, I think branding a name is important for survival. It’s a business decision that most artists make at some point in their career. At the end of the day, Art is a form of branding. I’m encouraging young artist to be more self-sufficient and brand themselves via the internet.

Part Two of the interview will be posted tomorrow……

www.HistoryStartsNow.info

….The studio was recently invited to attend a charity event to raise awareness of the international scourge of sex trafficking of children, to be held in Philadelphia at the Salt Art Gallery, on November 14th, 2009. Ms. Kristin Huggins, a former student of Temple University is part of a group of young women who volunteer their time and energy to raise funds to thwart this growing international problem. Kristin took some time out of her busy schedule to answer a few questions about the cause for our readership.

TW: How did you become involved in History Starts Now?

KH: The movie Traffic brought this issue to the center of my conscience, and when I heard about the charity, History Starts Now. They put out a casting call for models to walk in their Fashion Gives Back yearly event.  They ended up needing me for more volunteering, and I signed up to help organize their events. History Starts Now’s focus is twofold: spreading awareness of the enormity and horror of this crime, and raising money to fight this problem legally. We feel that the most effective way to stop sexual slavery is through the legal system. Very few buyers are successfully prosecuted. Less than ten percent of all arrests related to this crime are the clients, and over 61 percent of cases pursued are thrown out of court. Until the demand for underage prostitutes is curtailed, our nation’s children are at risk. One organization we work with on these issues is Redlight Children’s Campaign, which is headed by attorney, NYU professor, and Priority Films founder, Guy Jacobson. While people often hear of these crimes occurring in Southeast Asia, Columbia, and Eastern Europe, the media often overlooks how many American kids are victimized each year. History Starts Now’s primary focus is American children.

TW: I hear about it all the time in the news these days, which likely make’s the issue more like a pandemic, it’s spreading across many borders.

KH: According to Unicef, over 2 million children and young women are implicated worldwide in sex trafficking. Interpol considers this to be the third largest international criminal activity, but other groups feel it is second only to drug trafficking. Estimates on the revenue generated vary widely, as so much goes untracked. Anywhere from 9 to 20 billion is generated each year from sex trafficking.

TW: What is the age range of the victims of this type of crime? 

KH: In America, the average age of entry is 12 to 14 years old. Victims under 10 are less common but definitely exist within our own country’s borders. According to a study by Shared Hope International,  the average age of entry correlates to the average age of runaways. The most common form of underage prostitution is survival sex; the victim feels compelled to perform sexual acts for food, shelter, or some other “necessity.”  One Nevada treatment center discovered that roughly 30% of the victims they encountered were originally pimped by a family member. A 2006 Shared Hope International report financed by the U.S. Department of Justice proclaimed that incest was a training ground for underage prostitutes; some agencies claimed over 70% of all child prostitutes they encountered were sexually abused. Over 90% were supposedly physically abused.

TW: Which criminal element or organized crime group is at the head of the trafficking or are there a number of groups in the US and abroad?

KH: There is no singular crime entity at the root of this industry. There are many. In America, gangs often connect with female runaways, systematically hooking young women on drugs, while offering them “protection.”  When they feel their victims are dependent on them, they force these young women to prostitute themselves in exchange for drugs and “protection.” 
The pimp model is common. Their handlers often have a dozen adolescents that they manage, relying on a network of fellow pimps and facilitators to make their operations feasible and profitable.  Sex traffickers communicate to each other, letting each other know where they can sell without police interference. Facilitators include taxi drivers that direct customers to the location of victims, government and law enforcement officials that create, sustain, and enlarge loopholes, making these crimes profitable, and online websites that encourage pedophilia fantasies, harvesting the next generation of customers, often directing them to in-person stimuli.
Another significant trend  in this dark industry is moving the “merchandise” off the streets, making use of the Internets cloak of anonymity.Children are circulated through circuits, usually specific truck stops, hotels, and motels that have been scoped out. Facilitators help to connect potential customers to the pimps, thus preventing crackdowns by local law enforcement. Minors in group homes and foster care are targeted, often being lured in by an older boyfriend/friend promising love and affection.

TW: Does the crime impact primarily females or males as well?

KH: American boys are also victimized in this industry.  In the book, For Money or Love: Boy Prostitution in America, Robert Lloyd estimated that 300,000 boys are being trafficked right now in America. Referred to as chickens, they have similar profiles as their female counterparts, including a history of incest, mental, and physical abuse. While they are usually in “gay” capitals. it isn’t unheard of in small towns.

Sexual abuse plays a huge role in creating boy prostitutes. On average, their first sexual experience, typically with an older male partner, is at 9.6 years old. Most enter the business after running away, feeling conflicted over their supposed sexual identity, and unable to turn to their parents for guidance. Sadly, about half of these boys are thrown out for their “sexual identity”, when in fact, they were usually coerced into their initial encounters by sexual predators.

Tony Ward Interview

S.M. Where does your work start?

T.W. With a good cup of coffee at 7:00 AM with friends at a cafe near the studio. First, I stay current with the news by reading the paper front to back. We cajole about current events and after a while I head back to the studio to ponder who I will photograph or write about next for the daily blog which was launched in August of this year.

S.M. What most inspires you?

T.W. Well, over a 30 year career I’ve been fortunate enough to have been inspired by many things and or event’s in my life. Early in my career, I was inspired by the great documentary photographers that produced pictures for the big glossies. Life and Look are a couple that come to mind that included the photograph’s of legends, W. Eugene Smith and Gordon Parks. When I studied photography in college, especially during my two year enrollment in the Master of Fine Arts program at the Rochester Institute of Technology, I became more interested in commercial, particularly fashion photography and it’s impact on our visual culture. At that time, the late 70’s, I was inspired by the work of Avedon, Newton, Hiro and Bourdon. In the early 80’s, I found inspiration in corporate culture by being employed by one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies, Smithkline Corporation. After a four year stint at Smithkline, I opened a full service photography studio that produced imagery for many fortune 500 companies. The 90’s inspired me to explore the world of erotica, to travel and photograph women, preferably in the nude at various locations in Amsterdam, Hamburg, London, Paris, New York, Miami, Los Angeles and of course Philadelphia, my home. This decade is still being defined.

Interview

S.M. What do you like most about your work?

T.W. The freedom to express myself and most recently to put my thought’s in to words via the blogosphere.

S.M. What are the worst bits of your career so far?

T.W. The worst has been, at times when I was raising my family, I produced many pictures purely out of the motivation to make money, a means to an end. At that point in my career, although I was making a good living, the freedom that I had always sought in my work, particularly the subject matter was lost. I like many folk’s was ruled by the almighty dollar and was seduced by America’s capitalist culture. The best is when I work with a new subject, like a piece of raw clay….alway’s fascinated to see how I can mold it and to see what evolves from the encounter.

TW Interview

S.M. What are your plans for the future?

T.W. My immediate plans are a full time commitment to the daily blog. There are two new book projects ready to go to press and the development of a new fragrance.

S.M. How do you incorporate the variety of influences in your work?

T.W. The best thing I have found recently is the blog. It allows me to publish a variety of my interests and influences under one communications platform.

S.M. Where are you from, born, living?

T.W. When I am asked this question, which is fairly often, I refer to our current president Barack Obama. I also come from mixed parentage. My father’s root’s were African, although he was born in the south, Savannah, Georgia. He and his mother and younger brother, like many other people of color during that period of American history, migrated north for better opportunity. For a time, they lived in Harlem, then moved to Philadelphia where he met my mother Jean, a white woman of Italian descent. She was born and raised in South Philadelphia. They had three children. I was the last and have been living in Philly ever since. The city of brotherly love.

S.M. What’s your favorite thing right now?

T.W. Publishing the new books, the blog and as always pursuing the next subject!

TONY WARD INTERVIEW