Danny Lane is about to release his first hardcover book with a collection of super natural black & white photographs about comfort and confidence in a series of intimate, uneroticized nudes. All images are a de-sexualized study of the subject, shot on 35mm and showcases a diverse group of women at home in New York City — all photographed over the course of an afternoon.
We asked Danny to pick some hand-selected images out of the book for us including an explanation why each one was chosen for the book and the story behind it.
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Jess and Joyce are twins and they are so very sweet. This closeup sort of perfectly represents how they come across to me. They have excellent manners and they are relatively shy..they are great sisters and best friends. They make art together as Nudeux and they had just come back from a very inspiring trip to Haiti.
I love this photo of Alli so much. I don’t care that it’s out of focus. To me, it doesn’t get more personal than this. These kinds of ‘in-between’ moments are probably my favorite moments in the book.
I’ve shot with Alli a lot. This is a good representation of an afternoon spent together shooting. Again, I love how real this picture feels and I love the shape she is making. This was a no brainer for the book. I wonder what we were laughing about.
Bo lives really close to me. We took this picture in her roommate’s room..who is also in the book. This is a kind of pose that I was really into for Afternoons. It sort of explains sculpture as an inspiration. It’s definitely a messy shape and idea, but something about the way Bo pulls it off seems elegant to me.
This photo of Cece started a trend for me and you will see this exact kind of shot mirrored again and again throughout the book with different women. I mean Cece couldn’t look more perfect in this picture. Again, there is something statuesque about this. You can kind of stare at this picture for a while..for reasons more than boobs. It’s a total display of confidence, beauty and strength.
This is my girlfriend’s butt. I love this picture. It’s a framer.
This photo of Clare in the shower is so great. It is definitely the most authentic picture in the entire series. There isn’t much to explain. I walked into the bathroom while she was in the shower one day and snapped this picture of her. Me and Clare live together and she is the person I spend most of my “Afternoons” with.
Maddie is one of my favorite people to shoot with. She recently moved to Brooklyn, but she used to live really close to me in Chinatown when we shot these pictures. This picture was one of three options for the book’s cover. It didn’t end up on the cover, but it lives uncomfortably somewhere around page 40.
Afternoons is a book of nude film photos, but I couldn’t resist adding this photo of Melisa in her striped t-shirt. It was probably the first picture we took that day and I love the feeling of it. Her hand is so tangibly intimate with the camera. This is a particular vibe I try to capture as much as possible. This picture is similar to the picture of Alli from earlier.
This was the other option for the book’s cover. You can imagine how hard it is to choose an image for the cover of your book! Again I love this picture like a statue. We spent a lot of time on this photo and we had a lot of interesting conversations. This was actually the only shoot that didn’t take place in an apartment..we shot in a hotel room where she was staying uptown.
Vera is so natural on camera. It’s a real treat. This again is one of my favorite pictures in the book. I love her hair so much, I love that she is mid-movement and almost mid-conversation with the camera. This is a very comfortable nude. Vera has a great way of behaving the same way nude as she would fully clothed..which is very-much-so the point of this book.
I remember being very impressed with Nika’s new place. I know you can’t tell much from the way that I shoot. Like, I know this is a photo of a bed on a floor, but the house was very large and antique. There was light pouring in from the windows. Literally and emotionally I love the upside down feeling of this photo. Her gaze is straight into your eyes, very serious. Her hand-to-the-head gesture suggests a thoughtfulness that is very important for this collection.
