Wolfgang Tillmans photographs Frank Ocean for ‘Boys Don’t Cry’ magazine

Image of Frank Ocean with his hand covering his face (facepalming), water dripping off of him, standing in the shower with tiles in the background, wearing a Coban wrap bandage around his index finger, 'IN MEMORY OF U' ring around his pinky.

“I’m a Morning Person,” Boys Don’t Cry, p. 195.

In his magazine, Boys Don’t Cry, Frank Ocean appears in a series by German photographer Wolfgang Tillmans titled “I’m a Morning Person,” captured in Berlin in January 2015. The piece includes four portraits of Ocean, including the photo that adorns one of three Boys Don’t Cry magazine covers and the primary artwork for its companion album, Blonde. After its debut, Tillmans spoke about the photoshoot in an interview with Steve Salter of i-D magazine:

One time [Frank Ocean] canceled the shoot because the hair colorist wasn’t able to do her job in time. Even though it seemed rather extravagant, to say the least, the final result is so good that I think it was worth it. In my own work, I think a long time about the fold and curvature in a piece of paper, so in a way, I can relate to this. It was a certain dedication to the project to then drive 12 hours through the night from London to meet in Berlin. My studio is not a photo studio in traditional terms. I only photograph someone there once or twice a year. It’s usually a space where I work on my ideas, prints, and installations of prints. So when I actually do a shoot there, I take it as an opportunity to “dress it,” which is fun. At the end of the sitting, we did some final pictures in the shower, and as it was January and a sunny day, the light coming through the window was super warm. That’s when the [Blonde] album cover image happened.

The Blonde cover photo also opens “I’m a Morning Person.” It shows Ocean in the shower, framed by bathroom tiles, with water dripping down his body. His left hand shields his eyes from sunlight shining through an out-of-frame window. A Coban bandage wraps around his left index finger, and on his pinky is a Victorian-style mourning ring, inscribed “IN MEMORY OF U.”

The first image in the series is an edited version of Tillmans’ portrait titled “Frank, in the shower.” In the original, Ocean wears a second ring around his pinky that reads “University of Oxford, Class of 2007,” and one of the bathroom tiles in the background has three minor blemishes. Both elements were digitally removed from the magazine and album cover images and the photo series, likely because they were visually distracting.

The second portrait in “I’m a Morning Person” shows Ocean in a sunlit bathroom—an alternate shot of the previous scene. The third is a reverse portrait that captures him in jogger pants, doing a handstand on a yoga mat in Tillmans’ studio. The final image shows Ocean’s back as he leaves, descending a flight of stairs; he is wearing a Raf Simons 2003 Peter Saville “Closer” parka, selected by his stylist, Rita Zebdi.

In addition to his Boys Don’t Cry and Blonde photo contributions, Tillmans also performed his new song “Device Control” on Ocean’s visual album Endless.

The portraits from “I’m a Morning Person,” magazine scans, and related photography and artwork are all available below. For more by Wolfgang Tillmans, follow him on Instagram, YouTube, and Amazon Books; check out his portfolio via David Zwirner or his website.

Photography:

Select a photo below to view it fullscreen.

Scans:

Related Photography:

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Related Artwork:

Blonde, primary album artwork.

Boys Don’t Cry, magazine ‘shower cover.’

Blonde, Apple Music/iTunes promo banner.

Blonde, Apple Music/iTunes promo banner.

Blonde, Apple Music Japanese promo banner.

Blonde, Apple Music Twitter promo.

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Tags: Wolfgang Tillmans
Wolfgang Tillmans photographs Frank Ocean for ‘Boys Don’t Cry’ magazine
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Screen-Shot-2016-08-23-at-2.25.35-pm.png
Wolfgang Tillmans photographs Frank Ocean for ‘Fantastic Man’ magazine

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Wolfgang Tillmans explains how “Device Control” ended up on ‘Endless’
Wolfgang Tillmans explains how “Device Control” ended up on ‘Endless’

Wolfgang Tillmans is a German photographer by trade, but he’s been dabbling with electronic music for 30 years. He released his first EP, 2016/1986, in 2016 and was asked by Frank Ocean whether his new song “Device Control” from a forthcoming follow-up EP of the same name could be sampled.

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