"I moved to New York City because of people like this. I wanted to be around the art crowd and the weirdos and the freaks...and here was a full-on book of them. I was like, where do I sign up? I wanted in." —Ryan McGinley, from the Foreword
Idols, an authentic compendium of 1970s' New York style and attitude, and a confirmed masterpiece, began with an awestruck Larrain visiting Max's Kansas City in the explosively liberating early years of the gay rights movement. Featuring a generation of New York's most talented, outrageous, glamorous, and mostly gay personalities, the unique photographs in Idols are testament to countless hours his subjects spent applying original makeup and costumes in Gilles' now legendary SoHo studio. These arresting photographs may delight you. Perhaps they will offend you. They will almost certainly inspire you to ask questions about yourself and your sexuality. They will not leave you cold. The Halloween glamour of the transvestite world is captured in these superb photographs by Gilles Larrain. And, beneath the glitter and the pose, you will see the questing and vulnerable souls of people you might never meet outside these pages. People living out their fantasies gallantly, brilliantly, and desperately—posing the disturbing challenge, "Who do you think YOU are?"
