May 2002: The “Joy Givers”-Project

The “Joy Givers”-project is my favorite bailiwick at the moment. My goal is to create a series of portraits of young women.
One important purpose of these galleries is to celebrate the sensuous beauty of young female bodies.
I favor natural looking pics with a lot of atmosphere. Images that evoke – rather than depict – erotic fantasies. (Sterile studio shots I don’t believe in.)

Another purpose is to encourage women to be liberal and broad-minded. Puritanism is a big problem today; we have an unholy alliance of feminists, religious fundamentalists and plain nuts who seem to have only one goal: to recreate a quasi Calvinist society in which every form of individual freedom is constantly curbed.
And: I want to make my models proud of their looks. Quite often it takes some external input for that to happen. Photography is ideally suited to this task; the camera is a “definer” par excellence. For that reason I use only a small fraction of the footage – the very best.

Somebody said to me once: “You buy these women.” But you know what? Women are not buyable. Especially not the ones I choose for these galleries. They are proud, and they do nothing for money alone.
But they understand the nature of this project, they comprehend my desire and determination, they see the cause, and they help me achieve my goal – because they are friends, because they trust me, because they are generous women.

Let me tell you a curious story: A few years ago I had a Swiss “girlfriend” for nine months. I wrote her 25+ letters. But she never even came to my house in this whole time period! In my car she put her rucksack over her body as if to protect herself from me ... Without her mother she looked and behaved like a scared rabbit every time we met.

From this I eventually inferred that the chemistry wasn’t great ...
The women you see on my “Joy Givers”-pages did come to my house, some of them many times. They come here full of confidence and good will. Ready and cheerful. Bright eyed and bushy tailed.
And that makes every single one of these shootings very special and unforgettable.
I am deeply grateful for these moments of joy. (Trees and flowers and mountain tops and cows are nice too, but they don’t give one this kind of kick ...)

But the most important objective is this: I want to show that good intersexual communication is possible, even for a man my age. That an understanding between the generations is possible. That trust is possible. That generosity is possible. That men don’t have to accept humiliations from younger women. And: That Swiss women have competition, very serious competition. Swiss gals, you’d better shape up ...

I hope I succeed in conveying this message. And do you know what I usually say to all those idiots out there who try to disparage and decry this effort? I say: “Get a life.”