Exactitudes

Posted on January 3, 2008 Under Fashion

We've all experienced that high school moment where you realize that if you don't wear the right jeans to your next strut down the hallway, you"¦ will"¦ die.

It's that universal human desire to conform that's led to Exactitudes. This 13-year collaboration between Rotterdam-based photographer Ari Versluis and stylist Ellie Uyttenbroek is a study of how groups of people around the world express their individuality"¦ by dressing alike. Versluis and Uyttenbroek have traveled the world in search of fresh sub-cultures to explore. Whether the catalyst to fit in is created by class, gender, rebellion or other faces of identity, each individual subject in a series is posed and shot exactly the same as the others. When placed together in groups, it's the ubiquitous style code that's immediately apparent. The real interest is that by looking through the convenient veneer of sameness, it's actually each person's differences that unexpectedly shine through.

Plus, there are lots of Brazilian girls and boys in swimsuits. And that never hurts.