Olivier Zahm - A Founder & Editor, Purple Magazine

[MissMagAddict]

I know I started this thread... but he annoys me so much now for so many reasons... but mostly because he has completely ruined Purple Magazine. It was so much better once upon a time.

[IloveDiorHomme]

Purple is not a good mag these days .

I mean, I didn't buy the last issue, but I'm pretty sure I'll see Terry Richardson-Juergen-Teller-André-drunk topless girls at Le Montana...and they're always interviewing big names, they don't risks and are not enough avant-garde in my opinion.

I'm also sure that this issue is gonna be the Dash Snow tribute

[j'adorekapusta]

i remember reading someone's quote about Purple Magazine being a perfect translation of who Olivier Zahm is and vice versa. and that somehow convinced me about the whole thing. you know, it doesn't look like a noble fashion bible or a palace of dictatorship on what's cool. to me this looks like an invitation (even though a very restricted one) to the world these people are living in. the whole Purple experience feels like they're saying, "hey, pretty! come with us and we'll show you the live we're living. please don't worry about the drinks and keeping your pants on". this is the sort of lifestyle lots of people don't even dare to dream about and voila! here you have it, on the glossy pages of the magazine. it's not the best lifestyle nor it is the most specacular one... but there's something genuine about that makes you believe it exists somewhere out there (or in the 16th arrondissement of Paris). it's kitschy as long as it is autentical, it's scandalous as long as it articulates our best bourgeois feelings. what i like about it most is that these people don't really bother to care about others' reactions to what they do and how they live. this is not the case of tricky self-indulgence. it's just as simple as it is - a Parisian take on the live-fast-die-young mantra through the Ray Ban lenses of the chic Les valseuses of today.

[raerae]

Apart from the fact that I think he has a vibe around him that says that he can be a cruel and mean guy (i don't know him personally, so I can't really judge), he does have an amazing photography style in my opinion. And did you guys know he has a almost 5 year old daugther called Asia? She's a beautiful little girl!

[BerlinRocks]

Purple is a French fashion, art and culture magazine, since 2004 divided into Purple Fashion published by Purple Institute based in Paris and New York, and Purple Journal, published by Les Editions Purple, based in Paris. On February 16th the first installation of Purple Fashion's new online presence was launched. http://purple-diary.com can be considered as the extension of the magazine but as a digital voice that offers immediate access to the world of Purple — including Olivier Zahm’s personal pictures as well as a look into the next issue of the magazine.

History

In 1992, Elein Fleiss and Olivier Zahm started the magazine Purple Prose as a reaction against the superficial glamour of the 1980’s; much as a part of the global counterculture at the time, inspired by magazines like Interview, Ray Gun, Nova, and Helmut Newton’s Illustrated, but with the aestetics of what usually is referred to as anti-fashion. Based on their personal interests and views; Purple was, and in a sense still is, made much in the same spirit of the fanzine. The magazine quickly became associated with the "realism" of the new fashion photography of the 1990’s, with names like Juergen Teller, Terry Richardson, Wolfgang Tillmans, and Mario Sorrenti.



In the introduction of the Purple Anthology, Zahm writes:
“ [...] We launched Purple Prose in the early 1990s without any means, and without any experience, because we wanted to make a magazine that was radically different. We wanted to support the artists around us that noone else supported, much less talked about. [..] It would be a form of opposition of our own, different from the critical jargon of the generation of ’68. [..] From a visual standpoint, we represented the break from ’80s imagery (like Richard Avedon’s photography for Versace, for example). From an artistic standpoint, the artists of the early ’90s were rising up against art as capital fetish [..]. In saying that Purple is the portrait of a generation, I mean it’s a portrait of those who embody their times. At the same time, it’s a portrait of myself and Elein Fleiss, our ideas, our lives, and our aesthetics.


The art director of Purple Prose and Purple Fashion was Christophe Brunnquell until 2006, when he was succeeded by M/M Paris.
Offspring publications

Fleiss & Zahm’s collaboration has resulted in many side projects over the years:

Purple Prose
published from October 1992 to winter 1998 (13 issues).
Purple Fiction
a literary magazine published between 1995 and 1998 (4 issues).
Purple Fashion
published between 1995 - 1998 (4 issues), and 2004 - (present).
Purple Sexe
a magazine devoted to sexuality, published between winter 1998 and 2001 (8 issues). The magazine was reborn as an one-off appendix for Purple Fashion Fall/Winter 2008/09, dedicated to Italian porn star Rocco Siffredi.
Purple
a fusion of Purple Prose, Fiction, Fashion, and Sexe; published between summer 1998 and 2003 (16 issues).
Purple Books
a publishing house (1998 - 2001)
Purple Gallery
a Parisian art gallery
Purple Journal
a cultural magazine published 2004 - (present) in a French and an English version. Since 2004, Purple is divided in two different publications; Purple Fashion magazine (edited by Olivier Zahm and published by Purple Institute) and Purple Journal (edited by Elein Fleiss and Sébastien Jamain, published by Les Editions Purple).



Purple Fashion’s artist’s books

Since its second issue, each number of Purple Fashion comes with an artist’s book:
No.2 – Terry Richardson: Terry
No.3 – Richard Prince: The Hippie drawings
No.4 – Hedi Slimane: Interzone
No.5 – Juergen Teller: Ed in Japan
No.6 – Rita Ackermann: Good morning New York
No.7 – Helmut Lang: Selective memory series
No.8 – Dash Snow: You can't drink it if it's frozen
No.9 – Christophe Brunnquell: Annees Erotiques
No.10 – Harmony Korine: Pigxtras

from wiki.
that is so well informed, that i wonder if Zahm himself or an asst. working at Purple writes this.

Anyway, always thought the artists Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Bernard Joisten etc. were involved into Purple Prose ... They are not included there.

odd !


and here is Zahm bio

Olivier Zahm (born 1964) is a French art critic, curator, fashion editor, and art director.

[edit] Biography

Olivier Zahm worked as an art critic for Artforum, Flash Art, Art Press and Texte Zur Kunst during the 1980s and early 1990s. He is a renowned curator and has worked with over 150 exhibitions of contemporary art throughout the world, including institutions like PS1, MoMA, and Centre Pompidou [1]. In 1992, he founded Purple Prose magazine (1992 - 1998) with Elein Fleiss, and the publication has created spin-offs like Purple Fiction (1992 - 1998), Purple Sexe (1998 - 2001), Purple magazine (1998 - 2003), Purple Journal (2004 - present), Purple Fashion (1995 - 1998, 2004 - present), and Purple Books, a publishing house [2]. The "realistic", sometimes dubbed "anti-fashion"-, aesthetics of Purple was a reaction against the glamour of the 80’s, and can be linked with the global counterculture of that time, with the work of Juergen Teller, Terry Richardson, Wolfgang Tillmans, and Mario Sorrenti[3].
Since 2004, Zahm is editor in chief of Purple Fashion, a biannual magazine attempting to bridge the worlds of art and fashion. Zahm and Fleiss also run the Paris-based think tank Purple Institute, an art direction society and consulting company aimed at creating links between the art world and industry[4]. He has also art directed the Spring 2007 Yves Saint Laurent Homme campaign. [5]
The first installation of Purple’s new online presence was launched on Monday, February 16th 2009. http://purple-diary.com can be considered as the extension of the magazine but as a digital voice that offers immediate access to the world of Purple — including Olivier Zahm’s personal pictures as well as a look into the next issue of the magazine. Recent entries include "Vandalizing Public Art as Art," - a defense of art student Orion Giret vandalizing a group of public artworks created for the community of Montpellier, France, written by critic Jeff Rian.

whatever ......

anyone knows on what year was born Elein Fleiss ????
guess it's in the middle of 1960s ...

[y0shi]

BerlinRocks, thank you for that

Very informative indeed, I've given up on wiki long ago but what you've posted is actually pretty great! x

[BerlinRocks]

I didn't want to open a new thread for Purple Archives - in magazine thread. So just thought I could post these here .....

From Purple Fashion (1995-1998) and Purple (2001)
Photos by french artist Bernard Joisten



- source : bernardjoisten.com -

[*ana*]

- Olivier Zahm gets out of bed at 8 p.m. This guy is simply fascinating. Oh, and I love his watch.

garancedore.fr

[cocostyle]

in NY during fashion week, he was everywhere... parties, shows, after parties. standard hotel, restaurants..etc I think I saw him a hundred times! this guy never sleep ?...!!!
and in real person he is absolutely fascinating.

[raerae]

I hope to see him at Paris Fashion Week!

[sbiz]

no worries he will be there
He is everywhere...

[cocostyle]

for sure. just check out his purplediary.com

[Fuuma]

Originally Posted by cocostyle

in NY during fashion week, he was everywhere... parties, shows, after parties. standard hotel, restaurants..etc I think I saw him a hundred times! this guy never sleep ?...!!!
and in real person he is absolutely fascinating.

Well there were two Purple parties (Standard and that club promoted by the two dudes from Béatrice inn) he also was at the Jane and other hotspots, hanging out w. Richardson. He's more staggering than fascinating but I must say he's got that 70s manly peacock thing down pat and I like that so it's always cool to see him around.

Purple, like it or not, is a labour of love. They have like 2 employees and you know that it's not some random team of corporate journalists handling the whole thing. 90s anti-fashion giving the finger at Vogue and other photoshops rubbish.

[BerlinRocks]

^have you opened Purple FASHION recently ?
have you read Zahm's text in theanyspacewhatever cat. ?

I think you should. Coz it's no longer a finger to Vogue !

regarding the employee. I know someone who used to work (intern) overthere and it doesn't look like a great environment of work. though it's always nice to have Purple name on your resume.

and he's one of the dude behind André Montana etc.

[Fuuma]

Originally Posted by BerlinRocks

^have you opened Purple FASHION recently ?
have you read Zahm's text in theanyspacewhatever cat. ?

I think you should. Coz it's no longer a finger to Vogue !

regarding the employee. I know someone who used to work (intern) overthere and it doesn't look like a great environment of work. though it's always nice to have Purple name on your resume.

and he's one of the dude behind André Montana etc.

Well their mode of payment seems to be not to pay and I haven't looked at the actual mag in a long time but that's beside the point. While the content may not be to your liking right now I doubt the direction changed. As for Montana well I don't dislike hype clubs that much so...

theanyspacewhatever : I don't like relational art, I read about it sometimes but I didn't even go to see the expo.

note: I can't stand the photography of Richardson either and most party pics leave me comatose. That doesn't mean I can't recognize the cultural importance of some of these things.