We’ve been expecting you… Yes, there’s a new James Bond themed photo exhibition opening at Phoenix this month, and you won’t want to miss it.
The exhibition, titled NEMESIS, is by renowned photographer Andy Gotts MBE and features portraits of villains from the James Bond franchise.
During lockdown, Gotts spent time looking back over his 33-year career. Realising he was missing only six Bond villains photographs, he spent the next two years tracking down these Bond foes to create this epic portrait collection.
Andy Gotts commented, “My project Nemesis came about during lockdown. Like every other creative/artistic person, for a couple of years, there were no commissions. As I was in my third decade of being a celebrity photographer I thought I would use this period of time to look through my back catalogue and put together a retrospective book of my career.
“It was during this process I realized I had shot an awful lot of actors who have played a ‘Bond baddie’. I worked out there were only six actors still alive that had been a 007 foe that I had not shot in my 30-year career so I made it my mission to shoot them so I had the full set.” (quotes courtesy of digitalcameraworld.com)
Included in those that Gotts was still to capture, were Andrew Scott (Spectre) and Bond’s most recent villain, Rami Malek (No Time to Die), but a key one was Michael Londsdale, the foe Hugo Drax in Moonraker. As Gotts traveled to photograph Londsdale, he passed away just a week later. This is the very last portrait of him.
NEMESIS launched on display at the Carlton Tower Jumeirah in Knightsbridge in January.
The exhibition will launch at Phoenix Leicester on Friday 16 February. Entrance to the exhibition is free.
Phoenix is located at 4 Midland Street, Leicester, LE1.
