A tour of fine-art photographer David Yarrow’s new exhibition at Maddox Gallery in Mayfair, entitled Storytelling, reveals a contradictory facet of his work – an intriguing dichotomy between highly staged scenarios and images shot in conditions almost beyond his control. The former include carefully constructed scenarios featuring people in cinematic, atmospheric, often historical settings in the US or UK. To date he’s been inspired by mobster TV series Peaky Blinders and Charles Dickens’s novel Oliver Twist.
He enlists charismatic actors and models, notably Cara Delevingne and David Gandy, with whom Yarrow has a strong rapport formed through past collaborations, to appear in these. Tuned into Yarrow’s vision, they adopt personae and poses that capture the precise mood or period he aims to conjure up.
On the other hand, Yarrow trains his camera on animals capable of savaging or crushing humans – ever-changing light conditions permitting – in remote spots in Africa and the US. When photographing wildlife – he’s particularly partial to shooting lions – he plays with chance. One panoramic wildlife image depicts galloping mustang horses – you can almost hear them thundering towards the camera. Herds of stampeding mustangs have a habit of suddenly bolting in a different direction, so Yarrow had to wait for them to charge towards him and, what’s more, in optimal light conditions.
Yarrow was born in Glasgow in 1966. He studied accountancy at Edinburgh University and while there snapped prestigious sporting events. Aged 20, he covered the World Cup in Mexico. But a desire to be original and embrace self-expression led him to abandon reportage photography in favour of fine-art photography. “American photographer Ansel Adams said photographers either make or take pictures,” he tells me when we meet at the gallery, where preparations for the show’s VIP opening that night are in full swing.
He also switched to fine-art photography for financial reasons: “The only way a photographer makes money is in the fine-art market,” he says. Inspired by one of his heroes, Steven Spielberg, and an obsession with his movie Jaws, Yarrow snapped a great white shark in 2008, assisted by marine biologists. This kickstarted his passion for photographing wildlife.
But he resists being pigeonholed as a wildlife photographer. “It’s a crowded market and now I’m distancing myself from it,” he revealed during his speech at the VIP opening. To say that this was well-attended is an understatement. Around 600 people rocked up – including Maddox clients and Yarrow collectors. Celebrity guests ranged from Baroness Fiona Shackleton to Made in Chelsea star Mark Francis.
Yarrow’s speech lauded London as “the world’s most important creative centre of the arts”. He also exhorted any attendant young hopefuls in the arts to follow their dreams – just as he did – as they would materialise.
The overarching Storytelling theme comprises two parts: Storytelling, which includes images of Gandy, and his friend, actor Bill Nighy; and Natural World, which displays wildlife photographs on the ground and first floors. Titles next to each photograph engagingly incorporate an explanation of its backstory.
Earlier that day, Yarrow talked me through three images illustrating key characteristics of his work. The first images you see on entering the show feature Delevingne. This celebrity element, visible from the street, seems designed both to lure people into the exhibition and help reposition Yarrow as a photographer of people, not just of wildlife.
Yarrow met Delevingne in 2017 when she modelled for a Tag Heuer watch ad for LVMH, which he shot. In the background is a snarling lion; in an echo of its mane, Delevingne’s hair is tousled and leonine.
In one image, By Order of the Peaky Blinders, she stands commandingly in a tailored dress with a retro, heart-shaped neckline, a clearly subordinate cloth-capped gang assembled behind her.
“Gangster movies originally appealed as people were sceptical about the efficacy of central government,” says Yarrow about a subject that fascinates him. “The problem with them is that they’re traditionally male-dominated to the point of parody, so we made a woman the central figure. The best person I could think of for this was Cara as she has great authority.”
Yarrow uses the word “we” since he has a team of assistants to help confect the elaborate, often mythical mise-en-scènes of this and other images or to accompany him when he photographs wild animals, a major operation. When photographing lions, he often does so from a heavy metal cage.
By Order of the Peaky Blinders exhibits another Yarrow hallmark – atmospheric effects. Smoke-belching “Satanic chimneys”, as he calls them, and streetlights recede into the distance, wreathed by swirling fog. These images might look artificial but Yarrow likes to capitalise on ambient light (the available, existing light where a photoshoot takes place). “If you flood what you’re shooting with artificial light, you lose a lot of the character in it.”
Other works pay homage to a 1950s image of the American Dream and the romance of road trips. One, called Route 66, is an amalgam of all-American signifiers: a roadside motel, cowboys and sassy young women at the wheel of streamlined cars. Sometimes, seated next to the latter, are wolf-like dogs, adding a fairytale twist to the image. These are in fact Tamaskan dogs. “They’re a breed of dog that are 99 per cent wolf but harmless to humans,” explains Yarrow.
Conversely, photographing lions puts him in real danger. Of his piece, Marshlands – a magnificent image of a lion racing at 40mph towards the camera, mane billowing in the wind – he says, “It’s my strongest lion picture because it’s dynamic and got so much energy. I started taking pictures of lions in jeeps, which was very exciting. To go from that to photographing a lion close-up is part of my journey to take better pictures.”
Is Yarrow terrified when confronted by a lion? No, he says, stressing that self-preservation takes priority over recklessness: “That would be crazy. I’m married with two kids, so I wouldn’t put my life in danger.” But does his predilection for shooting man-eating or man-mauling creatures make him an adrenaline junkie? “No, I’d flip that round and say I get bored easily. Spielberg once said his biggest fear is boring people. It’s mine, too.”
This means Yarrow has to up the ante with each new image he creates – as he himself admits, a challenge he seems cheerfully willing to take on.
David Yarrow: Storytelling is on at Maddox Gallery, Berkeley Street, London from 27 October – 26 November 2023