Lost Boys

Others have said it better than I, but Russian-born New York-based photographer Slava Mogutin is one of the best around, for his work captures some of the sheer zest of being alive that I'm afraid too often gets filtered out of our day to day existence by the pressures of the quotidian. The book LOST BOYS seems to take us on a long journey, from the dreary and gray suburbs of Russia, where hideous brutalist architecture lies half-hidden under the eternal snows and mists, to the back rooms and bedrooms of a shrinking Bohemia---often New York, but in other photos it looks like Berlin or maybe Prague, Frankfurt, Florida. Critic Dominic Johnson overreaches a little, I think, comparing Mogutin's worldview to that of Godard, Sade, Rimbaud, Bunuel, etc, but his is a useful direction towards articulating a politics behind Mogutin's often garish photographs of boys, often barefoot or in their stocking feet, on the make. And how does politics work within photography? Johnson reaches out towards Mogutin's other art practices, installation work, poetry, video, collage and soon, to show how our auteur ultimately is not content to produce these remarkable prints, instead he is slowly and steadily punching holes in the paperbag of capitalism every which way he can.I don't see that these models are as 'emotionally unsatisfied' or 'transient' as Johnson claims. Most of them seem remarkably secure and open, though the fetishes some practice leave them open to charges of pathology or neurosis. I don't feel the darkness within Mogutin's work as stemming from the individual--though his title, Lost Boys, has that Joan Didion note of pity--rather he suggests that in our world of neoliberal globalism, who isn't lost?

Even as Russia is a puzzle to most Americans, this photo book by Mogutin may puzzle as much as inform. Yet it is a new kind of photo essay, a sociological survey of a culture rapidly changing. It seemed the end of the Soviet Union was a political revolution, but if political the revolution is far from over. More, from 1917 to a decade ago Russia did not evolve, frozen by the power state. Well, now Russian society is evolving and it is not clear that the political state has any control of that change. This book shows one aspect of the spin that Russia is in: photographically interesting but sociologically fascinating.RVMershart

I loved this book. I bought 'NYC Go-Go" previously and I loved Slava Mogutin's eye for those on the margins. It's unflattering and at times grotesque but never treated with condescension. "Lost Boys" has the same approach but it shows a lotta humour too.You never get to see this side of society represented in photography. And that's what I admire. An uncompromising outsider view.

These guys are very hot! An excellent book of young guys in the nude, in sex acts and otherwise. For the gay audience, or enlightened straight ones, this book is sure to please. They are all Russian, from a time when the old Soviet Union was thankfully on its last legs. They have an edge to them-these are working class boys mostly-young and beautiful. A must have for the collector of gay images.

Very nice. Liked the story and the pix are great!

I found it very original,and most photos fairly unique.

Slava Mogutin's Lost Boys is a unique combination of erotically charged imagery with a strong social and political context. Even though the geography of locations captured in this book includes a dozen of different countries, the most engaging and emotionally intense photographs perhaps come from Russia. Mogutin, who admitted in one of his interviews of having a "love-hate relationship" with his native country, refuses to follow a stereotypical western view of Russia as a totally grim and dysfunctional place; instead he shows us a different side of Russia that is colorful, sexy and full of youthful energy.

LOST BOYS, Slava Mogutin's first published monograph, sets out to shock and unveil the darker interstices of the lost youths who are the product of our urban moral decay. Mogutin was exiled form his native Russia for his 'malicious hooliganism with exceptional cynicism and extreme insolence', found his Gilead/asylum in the USA and has been highly visible as a performance artist and gay activist. This thin volume, with excessively wordy and pedantic verbal contributions by such luminaries as Octavio Zaya and Dominic Johnson, is a collection of Mogutin's photographs, basically of the male nude, but in Mogutin's case the nude figure is less important than the staged images he captures. In some images his thoughts are powerful: in some images there is little information and conflict that is supposed to illicit gut response from the viewer.Slava Mogutin's 'models' (the word is used instead of subjects, but the youths brought into this mélange are minimally attractive or interesting) are Russian wrestlers, military cadets, German skinheads, and football jocks - some at rest, some staged with bizarre sexually oriented stories, and some pushing the limits of sensual behavior. Some of the photographs succeed in inciting a visceral response from the viewer, and some simply feel like filler.That Slava Mogutin has something to say is obvious, especially if the Foreword and Essay are read prior to viewing the portfolio, but for this viewer there is less art and more social comment here, making this particular monograph difficult to assign in the very wide field of photographic art. Not a book for the squeamish but a viable statement from an exiled observer of some aspects of the human condition in this century. Grady Harp, December 07

Ok

数人の少年達が登場する写真集ですね。ヌードも少しありますが、風景などの普通の写真も結構あるのでちょっと物足りない感じがします。どちらかというと、アート的な物ではないでしょうか？少年が好きなら購入されてみてはいかがしょうか？腐女子の皆様にはオススメします！！

ein cooles fotobook, viele fotos erotisches inhaltes, sehr gut gemacht. wenn man homoerotik mag, ist es sicherlich ein buch, das man sich immer wieder gerne anschaut. starke fetish-teile mit soldaten und fuer sneakers und jocks-lovers :)gut.