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Interview: Love Land Invaders (14 pics)

Over the years, there have been a few projects that have really stood out to me. Because of its originality and flawless execution, Love Land Invaders by German duo Ralph Lagoi and Kate Lace sits on top of that list. Shot entirely in stunningly decorated love hotel rooms in Japan, the series is rich with bright, vibrant colors and extremely elaborate costumes. To find out more about their creative process, I reached out to Ralph and Kate to ask them a few questions… Where are you from? Can you please give us a brief description about yourself? We as Ralph Lagoi and Kate Lace are the artist duo behind “Lagoi & Lace”. We studied art and photography at the Academy of media Arts in Cologne, Germany where we graduated with honors. We want to cherish and celebrate excessively the power of beauty, the body and fashion through photography and art! Your work is so funky fresh. Where do you find inspiration? Thank you! We draw inspiration from lots of things like: Entertainment and pop culture, Japanese culture and its surreal output, nature and mythology, erotic bodies, fashion-design and art are perpetual inspirational sources. They all have one thing in common: a good vibrant portion of positive energy. I love how original your images are. What's your process like when you create a piece? We start with a grand vision or a general idea for a character or scenery. From there we try to condense and refine our ideas to form a compelling work and present it in an interesting composition. When this is done we prepare everything which is needed for the shoot, like designing and creating props and accessories. We either design the scenery or search for a location and occupy it with “Lagoi & Lace stuff” and add the model(s). Then we try to unleash the glitter of craziness, perversion, love, kitsch, lust and art and bring everything together with passion through photography. What are each of you in charge of? One could say our artwork is a combination of the best of both of us. We are both photographers, but we also do the art direction, costume designs and retouching together. We love to appear in our sets, therefore we sometimes are our own models like for example in the “Love Land Invaders” series. In this project Ralph Lagoi was in charge of the vector design work, including backgrounds, the eye-masks, shields, ribbons, and other cloth parts. Kate Lace was in charge of the headpieces and elegant fashion accessories, including jewelry, clothes and prop-design. How much thought goes into the bright colors and textures you use? The vibrant colors and special designed textured are an important part of the visual language of the “Love Land Invaders” series and our upcoming work. The graphic artwork was all designed especially for the project and accurately chosen to put it in combination with the accessories and armor like objects. The aim was to achieve a marvelous colorful pop-tastic mix of fantasy and art. This all was spiced up with glamorous, provocative staging, wild fashion and accessories, to in the end hopefully achieve the intense visual language we are after. Thanks for the interview, Kate and Ralph! Keep up the great work! Lagoi & Lace

Eugene Kim

Eugene Kim is the Editor-in-Chief of My Modern Met. In May, 2008, he co-founded the website to create one big city that celebrates creative ideas. His mission is to promote a positive culture by spotlighting the best sides of humanity—from the lighthearted and fun to the thought-provoking and enlightening.
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