David LaChapelle

David LaChapelle is a pioneering photographer and director whose hyper-realistic tableaus present profound social messages and a pivotal approach to imagery composition. In the late 1980s, Andy Warhol saw LaChapelle's highly saturated imaginings in a New York City gallery and offered him a photography job at Interview Magazine. LaChapelle was soon shooting for a variety of top editorial publications and creating some of the most memorable advertising campaigns of his generation.

His surreal aesthetic has elevated the covers and pages of Vanity Fair, GQ, Rolling Stone, Italian Vogue and French Vogue, and he has photographed some of the most celebrated stars, including Madonna, Andy Warhol, Muhammad Ali, Hillary Clinton, Lady Gaga, Whitney Houston and Angelina Jolie.

After establishing himself as a fixture in the contemporary photography industry, LaChapelle ventured into the world of videography. He began directing commercials, theatrical stage productions and short documentaries, including the feature film "Rize," which opened the 2005 Tribeca Film Festival in New York City. Other directing credits include music videos for Christina Aguilera, Jennifer Lopez, Amy Winehouse and several other artists.

In 2006, LaChapelle returned to fine art photography, presenting his work in solo exhibitions in galleries and museums across the globe, including the Barbican Museum, London; Palazzo Reale, Milan; the Musée de La Monnaie, Paris, and elsewhere. Past major exhibitions also were on display at the Lever House, New York City; the Hangaram Design Museum, Seoul, South Korea; the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, Israel; the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, Washington, D.C.; the National Museum, Kraków, Poland; and the Kestnergesellschaft, Hannover, Germany, among many others.

LaChapelle has received numerous accolades for his work. He was named Photographer of the Year by the VH1 Fashion Awards, earned the Young Photographers Alliance Lifetime Achievement Award, and was honored as Best New Photographer of the Year by French Photo and American Photo magazines. In 2015, he was awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of North Carolina School of the Arts. 

LaChapelle's two-volume monograph, "David LaChapelle: Lost and Found," will be released by Taschen in Fall 2017. The publication of these books completes his five-book anthology, which began with "LaChapelle Land" (1996), followed by "Hotel LaChapelle" (1999) and "Heaven to Hell" (2006).