Mainstream Photog Gets an Eyeful Behind the Scenes

AMSTERDAM—It's almost always amusing and a little bit enlightening when someone from society's mainstream delves, for one reason or another, into the world of hardcore porn and finds that, believe it or not, people who have sex on camera are pretty much the same as people who don't. But not all of those mainstreamers are as talented as photographer Sophie Ebrard, who, according to an article on Huffington Post, became "enthralled by the wildly popular and profitable market of pornography, [and] resolved to dig a little deeper into its underbelly in order to reveal the business in a provocative new light." That "digging deeper" led her to follow globe-trotting director Gazzman "to various set locations around the world" for four years, but rather than snapping shots of what was in front of Gazzman's camera, Ebrard was more interested in what was happening behind the scenes—and for the next three days, what Ebrard saw will be displayed in the collection "It's Just Love" at Amsterdam's Unseen Photo Fair—at least part of which is taking place in Ebrard's own home in that city. "The result, beyond the bouncing boobs and butts, is a humanizing portrait of like-minded people on the job, doing their best to make each other laugh and do their best work," assessed HuffPo's Priscilla Frank, who reproduced several of Ebrard's photos in the article, including the one above left. Other shots, according to Frank, depict "water breaks, banter amongst coworkers, costume adjustments and other playful, awkward in-between moments." "Over the past decade and a half in particular, we’ve become increasingly desensitized, even numbed, by sex in imagery, because it has become increasingly explicit and present," Roderick van der Lee, who curated Ebrard's exhibition, told Frank. "'It’s Just Love' incurs much stronger emotions, such as tenderness, humanity and a sense of fun by going in the other direction, by not being explicit, and by not falling into the traps of the many cliches of portraying the industry." "Somewhat strangely, porn is ahead of the moral standoff: it’s completely open about what it does and, whether you agree with it or not, it’s actually creating something," Ebrard herself reflected. "Any glimpses of nudity humanize, rather than objectify, the subjects." It's about time someone with decent mainstream cred understood that—and those who check out Ebrard's photos definitely won't be disappointed. Photo by Sophie Ebrard