There’s a reason why Toronto-native, Parisian-based photographer Benjamin Kanarek and I get along. In our digital-technology world of bullet-point, pulsating micro-moments, Benjamin Kanarek rows his production boat in the manner of a Manet painting.

His video of making “Symphony on Ice”, featuring model Luana Tiefke wearing Chanel in the September 2010 issue of Vogue Brazil, is a great example of Benjamin Kanarek in action. See Benjamin’s blog.

Don’t misunderstand me. It would be my kiss of fashion death to him, to describe Kanarek as refreshingly calming, superbly creative, artistically competent and — god forbid — having an accesible personality, in the frenetic world of fashion photography.

I’m sure Benjamin kicks serious butt as needed, but he’s just so not a diva, so not-self-absorbed, and so not full of himself, in spite of his considerable talent.

Fashion Shoot 101

You know the fashion video drill. Hair flying, music pulsating, everyone is beautiful and talented beyond belief. This business is not for mere mortals, but for God’s chosen people.

And excuse me, can you please get the whole video scene down to 90 seconds, because Internet viewers have no interest in understanding the genuine substance of working on a fashion shoot. Just give them the glossies, damn it. Readers don’t care about process; Powerpoint it.

Au contraire.

Benjamin shows us step-by-step how an entire team of people — down to the manicurist — created these splendid, blue-ice visual effects of Luana as the Violinist for Vogue Brazil’s September 2010 issue. Consider it a mini, eight-minute TED.com video for the fashion crowd, but without the activism.

Then again, it is activist to both feature and credit the manicurist painting Luana’s nails blue.

I believe Benjamin Kanarek is an old soul, adept at mixing classicism and art with modernism, high fashion and technology — while making the video arty, fashion-shoot educational.

As for the blue-mood, Chanel on ice photos, they radiate a warm, sophisticated, Parisian energy. Perhaps it is this creative balance that Kanarek has mastered.

Enjoy the beautiful Luana, photographed by Kanarek wearing CHANEL for Vogue Brazil, September 2010, in the Arman Suite of Paris’s Hotel Lutetia. Anne … and read my postscript after the photos.

PS: It’s all making sense now. Paul Coelho strikes again in my life. I keep bumping into him at weird digital intersections, this time looking for the Symphony on Ice video on YouTube. Instead I have Benjamin and Coelho together.

Paul Coelho appears in my very favorite personal essay at Anne of Carversville: Sailing Towards Ithaca | Paul Coelho | CP Cavafy (aka Kavafis).I wasn’t looking for him that night either.

I see a great deal of this essay in Benjamin’s work. Go to Benjamin Kanarek’s blog to watch the video and watch my essay to get an outsider’s understanding of what makes this talented photographer tick. I’m just guessing, of course … women’s intuition.

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