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The Disciples

For his project The Disciples, photographer James Mollison took photo montages of fans outside of music concerts. See if you can guess which concerts these groups of fans attended:

seven people who attended a Lady Gaga concert, wearing colorful, wacky clothes

seven people who attended a Merle Haggard concert, wearing mostly denim

seven people who attended a 50 Cent concert, wearing baseball caps, baggy jeans, and big jackets

eight people who attended a The Casualties concert, wearing leather and mohawks

eight people who attended a Tori Amos concert, wearing dark, muted colors

Here’s Mollison on the project:

Over three years I photographed fans outside different concerts. I am fascinated by the different tribes of people that attend them, and how people emulate celebrity to form their identity.

As I photographed the project I began to see how the concerts became events for people to come together with surrogate ‘families’, a chance to relive their youth or try and be part of a scene that happened before they were born.

Fascinating! From top to bottom: Lady Gaga, Merle Haggard, 50 Cent, The Casualties, and Tori Amos. Here’s a video featuring some of the photos accompanied by music from the corresponding artists:

Mollison published a book featuring the photos; a signed copy is available from his website.

Discussion  2 comments

Phil Gyford

Reminds me of Hans Eijkelboom's 'People of the Twenty-First Century' (on Colossal), which you mentioned in passing a few years back.

CW Moss Edited

I fine reminder that we all have our costume, and some of those costumes are more fun.

This makes me think of the simple beauty of Irving Penn's photography of people and their workwear. I think the story goes that Penn would offer these people a nickel if they came into his studio to let him photograph them. I'm curious if Mollison had to offer these people anything.

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