Photographer Max Siedentopf is on a mission to find the world’s hottest model. His first pit-stop is Gucci, where he took a heat vision camera to a shoot he was working on with the brand, gauging and capturing each model’s temperature between the standard takes.
“I was shooting a video for Gucci Beauty, and there was quite a bit of time between the scenes,” Siedentopf says. “It’s not every day you’re surrounded by dozens of models so I wanted to use that opportunity some more.”
Having lensed a number of Gucci’s idiosyncratic campaigns, including its most recent ‘accidental influencer’ shoot, this particular photo series was created as a way to subvert our preconceived notions of what being a ‘hot model’ means.
“I think when you hear ‘hot models’ a certain type of image immediately pops up in your head and I was asking myself how you could subvert this idea,” Siedentopf explains. “Beauty comes in many shapes, shades, sizes and perspectives and ultimately, you can be just as hot inside as outside.”
The resulting images distort the models’ faces, with only remnants of their Gucci clothes on show. On one model you can only slightly see the house’s signature monogram logo, while in another picture the oversized eyewear chain debuted in the house’s SS20 show is the main feature.
With his own temperature averaging at 34.2°C (“unfortunately neither hot nor cold” he confirms), the true goal of the project was to highlight that beauty, or ‘hotness’, is more than skin deep. “I think when talking about how hot someone is, it’s usually very subjective and everyone has a different opinion,” he explains. “However with these temperature results, it’s a much more accurate and objective way to measure the hotness of a person.”
Revealing that there are still “a lot of people to measure,” Siedentopf intends to continue with the personal project until he finds the hottest model of them all. As Paris Hilton once put it: that’s hot.
