Photographer-Filmmaker Roy Stuart Talks About His New Book

“Glympstorys” Photographer and filmmaker Roy Stuart talks about his new book

By Christine

“With this new book it was possible to advance the discovery that women can be beautiful as they are, gone are all useless female adornments like high heels, stockings, excessive make-up, we can finally see females as if they stepped out of a dream…”

American photographer and filmmaker Roy Stuart is back after 5 years of absence with his 320 pages new book called “ Glympstorys” where it´s about female sexuality, sexual pleasure, beauty and nudity all captured in a pure, honest and raw way. His work is full of infectious emotions, a boon in a hypocritical society trying to hide natural emotions into something immoral. Pictures that actually fight for the self-evident freedom, detached from purpose. Roy grapples a lot with those sort of things and uses sexuality in his art just the same way feminist groups are doing it when presenting messages on their bare breasts. “In Western culture nudity, sexuality and beauty have always been linked to the notion of truth and pursuit of knowledge. When referring to truth in it´s purest form don´t we say the naked truth? And isn´t beauty a door trough which we awaken the dead, for a moment, a moment of desire, desire of the other, where after introspection, the understanding of this pleasure fades away beyond our grasp.”

It has been 5 years since your last book was published. Do you feel that this new book is a further development of you after those years?
Yes, now with this new publisher it is possible to advance the discovery that women can be beautiful as they are, gone are all useless female adornments like high heels, stockings, excessive make-up, we can finally see females as if they stepped out of a dream but there is also the warning to men to be careful because female sexuality is much superior to men’s and coupled with romantic love, thoroughly capable of transporting you onto other fabulous dimensions, it is very strong medicine, it can destroy you.

What constantly drives you to make new photo sessions?
Usually it’s the model. All the best photo sessions are collaborations with the model.

You were also criticized a lot for your work. What do you reply to those people, who say that the women in your pictures are degraded? The only criticism I am aware of is the imaginary one I orchestrated in the ARTE documentary that I produced and directed where an interviewer purposely attacked me for allegedly treating women as objects. 

And how much does critics bother you after all? Does it change something in your work?
As I stated, the critic I’m aware of is the fictional one I wrote myself. We like to use female sexuality the same way as the the feminist group FEMS who write political slogans on their breasts to attract attention or advertising who use sex to sell products, usually worthless ones. We use sex to attract attention so we can get across ideas, usually quite subversive ones. 

You describe the new book as being more subversive and sexier than the last one. Was that on purpose? What I mean is that did you purposely shift to a more “extreme” or it just happened automatically as a part of the process? Part of the process. I don’t like to feel that we’re trying to play cat and mouse with the censor, as if we are trying to hide behind an aestheticism in order to have the work deemed acceptable. More subversive because there are no outdated fetishy elements . Plus this new book contains some great writing by the likes of Houellebecq and Castenada plus some subtle warnings to men to be careful. Sexier because young healthy girls can be very delectably sexual in their extreme naturalness.

How important is love for you? And how do you relate love to sexuality?
This is an immense subject and would take pages to cover properly. Suffice to say the the secret ingredient in sex is certainly romantic love.

I read that you are really into music, what is your current favorite track?
Everything by Stromae and The Dandy Warhols and a remix by lil’ Sneezy of ’Your Woman’ by White town

The best life-lesson so far?
I’ll give you a quote from J.M. Coetzee’s masterpiece, ‘The Lives of Animals’ “Let me say it openly: we are surrounded by an enterprise of degradation, cruelty, and killing which rivals anything that the Third Reich was capable of, indeed dwarfs it, in that ours is an enterprise without end, self-regenerating, bringing rabbits, rats, poultry, livestock ceaselessly into the world for the purpose of kill- ing them.

The most important thing in life is?
Advice? Be a good person and don’t grow old.

www.lipanjepuntin.com/artists/stuart.html
www.roystuart.net
“Glympstorys” 320 Pages with DVD
check/money order to:
studioc2014@gmail.com