Robert Pattinson: VMAN’s Most Wanted Series

Robert Pattinson is one of the five in-demand men in the planet that was painted by Pop painter Richard Phillips for VMAN’s Most Wanted Series.

In this series, Mr. Phillips uses mail idols not only for their sexual lust but of commercial desire as well, placing them against step-and-repeat backdrops that question the relationship between celebrity and commerce. For Rob, he chose the Louis Vuitton backdrop.

I see a rainbow and I want to paint it black. Men experience a curious mix of love and hate when they look at images of their celebrity brethren. They see the person they want to be and the competitor they want to destroy. Richard Phillips is known for his figurative paintings of high-gloss surface glamour fraught with questions of fame, power, and commerce. In his newest work, “Most Wanted,” commissioned exclusively by VMAN, Phillips sheds new light on some of America’s most recognized faces. Like the phases of the moon, Phillips’s portraits illustrate the temporal stages in the lives of the most in-demand male celebrities.

In these portraits, the subjects stand in front of “step-and-repeat” backdrops, the staged red carpet photo-op settings supplied by advertisers sponsoring premieres and events. Actors get press coverage by being photographed in front of walls plastered with sponsor logos. Sponsors get their brands blessed by the power of celebrity. By reinterpreting these photographs (which Phillips describes as “utterly worthless, and completely harnessed to commerce”) in pastel, Phillips has effectively brought each of these famous men into the realm of sorcery. The medium recalls ancient cave painting, where our ancestors used abstract depiction to conjure the essence of what they drew. The gestural quality makes these boys more touchable than the camera ever could, and more real, yet their poses and the Easter egg colored backdrops retain an implacable otherness. They remain above and beyond us still.

Click on the link to view other male celebrities who made the list.

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