Matthew Rolston is a photographer, director, and creative director renowned for work that is at once classic and completely contemporary. A modern approach to glamour is one of Matthew's hallmarks, embodying Hollywood's past and its grand tradition of celebrity portraiture; his approach has literally helped to define today's aesthetics of celebrity and beauty photography.
Matthew's singular style has been called upon by fashion and beauty clients ranging from the Gap to Esteé Lauder and Polo Ralph Lauren, and to magazines such as Vanity Fair, Harper's Bazaar, Vogue, W, GQ, Esquire, and The New York Times Magazine. For Rolling Stone alone, he has photographed more than 100 covers, collaborating with musicians and celebrities including Daniel Craig, Johnny Depp, Jack Nicholson, and Bob Dylan. In 2012, Time magazine named his infamous, blood-splattered Rolling Stone cover portrait of the cast of HBO's True Blood one of the "Top 10 Nude Magazine Covers" of all time.
"Even though my work is incredibly diverse, there must be some uniting factor," observes Matthew. "Clients always call it 'Matthew Magic.' I'm not sure what that is; perhaps it's a special kind of romance."
In a career filled with important milestones—from being "discovered" by Andy Warhol for Interview magazine to directing award-winning music videos for artists such as Christina Aguilera—Matthew continues to grow as an influential artist. In 2011, he added the title of creative director to his resumé, collaborating on the brand design of several boutique hotels, including the award-winning Redbury in Hollywood and New York City's Hotel Lola-a branding project for which he was honored at the prestigious 2012 Hospitality Design Awards. In 2011, Matthew established his own in-house production company, R-ROLL, to provide his mix of editorial, advertising, and entertainment clients with behind-the-scenes documentaries of his photo and film assignments.
"We're now entering an era where the 'making of' is just as important as the 'of.' Maybe more important," he notes. "This is not me acting as a photographer or a director, but as a producer, working with a group of very talented young filmmakers. Being a filmmaker myself, I have an innate understanding of how to produce this type of content in a engaging and entertaining style consistent with the look-and-feel of the print and film assets we normally create."
Matthew's work has
been exhibited at prestigious galleries across the United States, in Europe and
Japan, and at numerous museums, including the Whitney Museum of American Art in
New York City and at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. His images
have also been collected in two monographs: the limited-edition Big Pictures
(Bulfinch Press, New York), which features an introduction by film director Tim
Burton; and the lavish limited-edition coffee-table book beautyLIGHT, published
in 2008 by leading German art-book publisher teNeues.
