Less than Zero. Impersonal Affect in Hedi Slimane’s Auteurial Style

This article proposes a critical reading of the photographic work of Hedi Slimane (Paris, FR, 968-) by teasing out the relation between his photographic (dis-) engagement with his subjects and the employment of an impersonal style of affect. I begin with an overview of the emergenceof the fashion creative director as a stardom figure at the turn of the 21st century, and I proceed with an inquiry into the auteurial iconography fabricated by Slimane in the last ten years. Tackling the intricate bond of style and masculinity against the backdrop of queer theoretical concerns,I offer an analysis of his main photographic anthologies from the last ten years. I conclude with a reflection on Slimane’s self-narratives in the context of the relationship between biography and historiography.