In 1994, love was all around photographer and provocateur Bob Carlos Clarke. So he did what came naturally to him – pulled out his camera and made a comprehensive collection of photos of young lovers getting off with one another.
These images, which will be shown collectively at The Little Black Gallery under the title The Agony & The Ecstasy, were taken in the hormone pressure cooker that is public school balls. “Carlos Clarke, who was sent to board at Wellington College, saw this orgiastic spectacle as ‘a peculiar side effect of a British public school education’, in which access to the other sex is limited to the point of obsession, if not actual sexual persuasion,” writes Max Houghton in the show’s eponymous book, which will also be released in May.
Often referred to as the British Helmut Newton, the late Carlos Clarke’s oeuvre is heavily laced with sex, nudity, bondage, and eroticism. But even with the controversial nature of his work, his photos were boundary-less; crossing from fine art to celebrity portraiture, and advertising, and back again, at the click of his shutter.
The Agony & The Ecstasy will be on show at London’s The Little Black Gallery from 12 – 26 May 2018. Limited edition prints are also available. Visit www.thelittleblackgallery.com for further info. Bob’s daughter Scarlett has set up an Instagram page to celebrate his work, follow here
