Photographer Vincent Six is adventuring uncensored


By DREW Rowsome
6 May 2019

"I’ve always been a cinema guy. I love to sit and enjoy a good story that takes me away from reality," says photographer Vincent Six. "I never liked to take random photos. I love to photograph with a purpose and I found that books provide the perfect format to tell stories or create small experiences with my photos. In the digital world there are too many distractions. My books force you to put your phone aside and appreciate this form of art."

Anyone who has seen Vincent Six's photograph can appreciate their otherworldly grounded in nature quality. The beauty of the wild and the beauty of the male form combined to create an enhancement of both. "All my life I’ve been living in big cities and I always missed being closer to nature," says Vincent Six. "When creating, I always try to bring to life memories I lived when I was young. Memories of me enjoying long summers out of town with my friends and family. Bonding stories, bike trips and daily adventures from sunrise to sunset. While I often miss those good old times, my photos are also inspired by new adventures I would love to experience, but I haven’t yet had the chance to pursue."

Vincent Six's first book, You, Me, The Woods, has a literal narrative. He describes it as "a kind of a short-film in photo-book format. It was a very intimate experience for all of us involved. The models were a real couple, their first time in front of a camera. We spent a full weekend shooting in the woods in southern France. We barely knew each other before the shoot, but they welcomed me with open arms. The things they shared about their life and their relationship during the shoot helped me to write all the narrative afterwards. I always start a project with a blurred idea or concept in mind and I let the experience shape the art and take a form of its own. Every photoshoot is an adventure and I love to be surprised."

The filmic quality comes naturally. "When I was young I directed lots of short-films, music videos, commercials," says Vincent Six. "Every one of these projects involved big teams and lots of money. I wanted to keep on creating video, but it was too expensive and slow to produce, so I found in photography a way of stripping my art down to the basics. I decided to focus on the creation of single frames that could tell a story if you stuck them all together. Funny enough, now I’m starting to film short clips during my shoots and I expect to release a nice movie about the creation of my next book Pacific Spirit when it releases in October."

Vincent Six's art is continuing to evolve with six hardcover books to come under the 'VINCENT' collection label. "All of the books are about men enjoying life and nature. Each book contains more than 200 uncensored photos of 25 models I photographed exclusively for this purpose. The narrative is very open and visual. I hope that everyone conceives their own stories while watching the photos." And even beyond nature. "In the book I’m releasing this month, Firewood, there are many indoor shots. They represent my awakening, the moment before I decided to step out and explore the world."

But his exploration of the world is far from over. "I love hiking and exploring new places when I’m not photographing or working in films," he says. "There is a little adventurer inside me. Every time I go hiking with friends they hear me say, 'I need to shoot someone here.' Many friends also tell me about places they have been, which they think would be a good location for a photo shoot. I have a big list of locations awaiting for the right model to come along."

The right models are not hard to find though Vincent Six has some specific qualities he looks for. "Attitude and passion. That’s all. It’s not about having a perfect body. Perfection doesn’t exist. Through my eyes, every model I shoot is beautiful for different reasons. Maybe because we spend the day laughing, and often realize how many things we have in common. I love to shoot models with whom I feel I have a connection. Just imagine that you go to the mountains and hike for two hours with someone you don’t get along with . . . That’s my worst nightmare, so I choose very carefully the models after talking a lot with them prior to shooting. This also helps them realize that they can trust me with their photos."

Trust goes both ways. "I approach the shoots in a very natural way. I don’t ask them to do weird poses. I don’t like male photography that portrays men as cold Greek god statues. I want my models to feel approachable, as if they were a good friend. I ask them to be themselves, to enjoy the moment we are sharing. I believe that if you create an environment where the model is having fun, living an adventure, enjoying the landscape and feeling like they are part of the project, you’ll always get memorable photos."

Part of what makes Vincent Six's photographs so memorable is both the natural and the au naturel state of the models. And how relaxed they are with being nude. "Many models have texted me afterwards to tell me how special and liberating it was to do something like that. I find my models one hundred percent on Instagram. When I opened the app for the first time some years ago I never imagined how big of a role it would play in developing my photography career. I met all my models via Instagram. It’s always a bit awkward to send a message to someone you don’t know and ask them to model nude, but in general, all of them get very excited about the idea when they see my work and they see its artistic, rather than erotic, focus."

Alas there can be a stigma when it comes to male nudity. "Art is always subjective," says Vincent Six. "Some people, depending of their cultural backgrounds will see a nude as something very natural and others will think is hardcore porn. When I shoot, my focus and main attention is on trying to capture the experience of merging with nature and feeling free. I love to take photos that inspires a different kind of freedom that anyone can enjoy. I think society pushes us very hard on what is acceptable and what is not. In many countries, such as Germany, nudity is the most normal of things. There you can enjoy a sauna naked with your colleagues after work, boys and girls together . . . it’s part of their culture. I wish more people could experience something like that."

Vincent Six, who is very photogenic himself, knows of what he speaks. When asked if he enjoys being nude in the outdoors he enthuses, "I love it!" before qualifying, "I was so scared the first time I went to a naturist beach. It took me a little while to take off my swimsuit. Since that moment, I never wore it again while on a naturist beach and that was 16 years ago."

If only social media had the same attitude. Vincent Six feels he has been censored "Much less than any of my fellow photographers," but bemoans that "Instagram has some unclear rules about nudity which are often applied arbitrarily. If they remove one of my photos I accept it and I don’t make a fuss about it. I don’t own the platform, so if I want to use it, I have to accept the rules. Everybody's free to find a platform that works for them. That’s what I did with my books. I publish all my uncensored photos, which wouldn’t be allowed on Instagram. So if one of my photos is removed from Instagram, don’t panic, that photo will be included in my next book and everybody will be able to enjoy it. However, I would love Instagram to be more communicative when something like that happens, there isn’t any form of appeal available, it’s just too opaque."

While agreeable with the strictures of social media, Vincent Six will not compromise his art. "I thought many times about doing some commercial photography so I could financially support my books and other artistic projects, but I just can’t. This always has been an internal battle for me. I don’t think I would be good enough. When I photograph I need to feel super passionate about what I’m doing. For me, photography is a way to escape reality and I don’t want that to become another job. I want to be free and I don’t like my photography work to be constrained in any way."

To remain true to his art Vincent Six created the publishing company VINCENT IV, home not only to his ever-growing body of work but also fellow artists including Ego Rodriguez and Hajime Yamamoto. "I learned so much self-publishing my first book that I wanted to help other artists I admire to publish their works. Instagram has given a lot of visibility to many artists, but it doesn’t give you, in most cases, any revenue to support and expand your work. Many artists could do amazing things if they had some support to help them grow. That’s why I wanted to create a publishing company that puts the artist first. When other artists publish with VINCENT VI, they receive 70 percent of the book sale and the remaining 30 percent I use it to cover all the publishing costs. I didn’t start the publishing business to earn money, but to help artists grow."

Vincent Six and VINCENT VI are currently based in Vancouver. "Nature was the main reason why I came here," he says. "Before Vancouver, I lived in London for nine years and I missed the proximity of the sea and the mountains. Vancouver felt like the perfect combination. I also work as a visual effects film artist and Vancouver has a thrilling film post-production industry. I love to combine books and film work. It keeps my mind busy and I learn a lot from artists that create incredible award winning films."

Upcoming VINCENT VI productions are Firewood to be followed by Pacific Spirit and Boreal. And he notes that, "Next year, I’d love to make another small book like You, Me, The Woods with a defined narrative and a filmic look." And he has other ambitious plans. "I would love to be able to travel more and reach more remote places. I’m taking a surviving in the wild course in the coming months and I dream about being able to gather some models and travel to Alaska or a remote island for a weeklong shooting adventure. I’m working on ways to be able to fund shootings like that and offer ways for people finance or support these and feel part of the experience. I think a photo is only a small percentage of the overall experience and I’m going to work on offering something beyond photos."

And in the meantime there is business to be taken care of. "My books can be bought at my website vincentsix.com or through instagram @vincent.six and I sign and ship each one of my books personally," says Vincent Six. "I take care of everything. I’m thinking about the possibility of offering limited prints of images I haven’t shown before, but I want them to be very special so I’m still working on some ideas. I don’t want to disappoint anyone as I only want to offer high quality content. Even though calendars are very popular, I won’t offer them for now. I think the enjoyment of seeing those pics in a calendar is not quite the same as that of a book, so I am focused on printed books only, full of original content and never before seen images. I love to give my supporters unique images that only they can see and which cannot be found anywhere else. My books are like a little secret that only the models and our supporters share."

MGT and mygaytoronto.com readers are invited to get in on the secret with a five percent discount on the upcoming Firewood by using the code 'MGT.'