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01. Vioro

Portrait + Promotion
Lobe Block

Back in late March, 2022, I met with Australian Bass-Baritone Paull-Anthony Keightley to discuss ideas for our upcoming shoot together in Berlin.

Paull-Anthony is a chorus member at Staatsoper Unter den Linden and has a new music project together with colleagues Thomas Johnson, Jonathan Ware and Simone Easthope:

Vioro

The base of operations for Vioro’s performance, mentoring and consultation work is Lobe Block, Gesundbrunnen, and it was hard for me not to be impressed by the sheer scale and visual weight of its architecture. As I walked through jagged corridors and scaled the M.C Escher-esque exterior of Lobe Block with Paull-Anthony, I immediately eyed potential spots for us to work in.

The building reminds me of the kind of clean, concrete designs you find in public spaces in Zürich, but Lobe Block has more of a haphazard ‘Berlin’ feel to it than just that. The chicken coop in the rear garden, the random piles of wood on the ground outside and the shimmering silver curtains on every window at Lobe Block give this place a scrambled and yet harmonious quality.

It was the right setting for our work together.

Paull-Anthony explained that, in the shots, the group should look “approachable, fresh and not too staged”. His inspiration was 90s fashion and editorial photography from New York - the kind of candid, energetic and bold model shots from Vogue that now get regurgitated on social media to match current trends. I could see why he was into that look, and why it resonated with his vision for Vioro.

They are a group of young, business-minded musicians daring to try something bold.