Juergen Teller’s nativity
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Photographer Juergen Teller first discovered the Grand Hotel Villa Serbelloni while shooting an advertising campaign for Saint Laurent in 2019. He later returned there with his creative partner, now wife, Dovile Drizyte. A four-generation family-run hotel on the shore of Lake Como that dates from 1873, with a Michelin-recommended restaurant and, as Teller says, “an excellent bar”, Villa Serbelloni offered the kind of expansive luxury typical of 19th-century establishments, its scores of rooms an eclectic blend of empire, neoclassical and art nouveau tastes. “I really liked the neoclassical glamour,” says Teller. “It felt really good to me. And then, a couple of years later, we went there for a wedding. And at that time, I – we – wanted to get pregnant…”
A seed was planted. Metaphorically at least. What if they were to try for a baby in each of the hotel’s 94 rooms? And document the quest? The photographic concept was discussed with the hotel manager (albeit with no specific details). And the project got underway the week after the hotel’s summer season closed.
The Myth captures Teller and Drizyte’s own nativity journey, and an adventure around Villa Serbelloni. Like many couples trying to have a child, they followed the ancient lore of fertility that after sex a woman elevates her legs. The resulting pictures capture Drizyte in various situations in the hotel’s wildly different bedrooms. A bit like Where’s Wally, but with many, many sets of feet.
The series is currently on show at Galerie Suzanne Tarasieve in Paris. It’s also part of a larger exhibition opening at the Grand Palais Éphémère this weekend. The show is a massive overview of Teller’s canon featuring his portraiture – of Kate Moss, Charlotte Rampling and Alexander Skarsgård – personal projects and hundreds of fashion shoots. The exhibition will transfer to Milan in January next year.
As a study, The Myth is humorous and silly, but it also makes for a surprisingly tender work. It captures a couple at their most vulnerable and powerless. It takes on a special relevance at this time of year when we consider the “miracle” of birth. The endeavour also came to take on its own significance for the couple. In some rooms, they discovered various maternal totems – a wooden sculpture of a pregnant woman, a portrait of a mother cradling an infant, nativity scenes – that they came to understand as signs. “It felt like that location was prepared for us,” says Teller, “like on a film set. It was incredibly beautiful. I think it’s the most romantic project I’ve ever done.”
One question. Did they actually have sex 97 times, in every room at Villa Serbelloni? That Drizyte and Teller are keeping to themselves. “But, as you can see,” says Teller, raising a gurgling, bouncy girl called Iggy up for inspection, “we now have a beautiful baby of our own.”
The Myth is showing at Galerie Suzanne Tarasieve, Paris, until 27 January 2024. i need to live is showing at Grand Palais Éphémère, Paris, until 9 January 2024, and then at the Triennale Milano, 27 January to 1 April 2024
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