Every Stormtrooper dreams of relaxing poolside with a beautiful nude woman. Or so one would imagine after looking at one particular image shot by photographer Tony Kelly. In it, a white-armored minion of Darth Vader romantically rests his arm around the waist of a tall, high-heeled model as the two stare into the bright blue horizon, surveying their city below. It’ s this combination of splashy color, quirky sense of humor, and unabashed sex appeal that makes Tony Kelly’ s latest book, Taken!, a celebration of pleasure in all of its forms.

Born in Dublin, Kelly actually began as a photojournalist with the United Kingdom’ s Independent Newspaper Group. His assignments took him to cover heavy subjects like the devastating civil war in Rwanda and the war in Afghanistan. It was a life that, according to the photographer’ s management company Copious, made Kelly unafraid of“ emotions or flesh.” After observing such darkness, it’ s no surprise Kelly switched his focus to something a little lighter, like fashion and celebrity photography.

Which brings us to today. Kelly’ s clients have included not just publications like Vanity Fair, Vogue, GQ, and treats!, but brands like BMW, Steve Madden, and Custo Barcelona. These days, he does mostly fine art photography, some of which is displayed on his website Tony Kelly World, but his vibrant style is ever present.“ The first thing I look for in an image is whether or not it entertains me,” Kelly says. So when he was asked to do a book of“ entertaining nudes” for teNeues, it was an

© TAKEN! ENTERTAINING NUDES BY TONY KELLY, PUBLISHED BY TENEUES, $ 65, WWW. TENEUES. COM

amazing fit.“ What entertains me is humor, and when humor can cross with female nudes, it’ s a refreshing result.” Kelly had been so bored with most nude photography.“ They just put this girl against a white wall,” he groans.“ I wanted to do something lively, something different.” Taken! is the product of Kelly’ s efforts.“ The book features my sense of humor, my signature twist,” he says.“ Like a lemon in a martini.”

Taken!, released in winter 2016, features both archival and new work shot specifically for the book. It’ s a summery, energetic antidote to cold weather blahs( especially since one of his models for Taken! is sun goddess Charlotte McKinney) with polished yet subversive images in motifs of travel, luxury relaxation, and lust peppering its pages. In the book, one model lies nude on a pizza float in a vibrant aqua swimming pool, knees tilted ever so coquettishly. Another leans powerfully in the doorway of an airplane, a backdrop of black highlighting her slim figure bronzed from the sun. One more lies facedown on a towel, a shadow of an airplane coming in for a landing on her bare back just above a pert, round derrière.“ It’ s about having fun,” Kelly says.“ It’ s about enjoyment.”

In Kelly’ s luxury dreamscape, you’ d be happy just to be there for a moment, ecstatic to live there for the rest of your life. His photography is the kind of work that makes you want to meet the man and shake his hand, then also hate yourself for not having thought of it first.

OPPOSITE: PHOTO © 2016 TONY KELLY. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. WWW. TONYKELLYPHOTOGRAPHY. COM / IMAGE TITLE: AERIAL 2

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