Wildernesses

Wilder­ness­es is the prod­uct of a thir­teen-year col­lab­o­ra­tion between pho­tog­ra­ph­er Erik Noppe and mod­el Sara Scar­let, which reflects a shared love of nature and adven­ture, and has tak­en them to diverse loca­tions across eleven Euro­pean coun­tries. Many of the places they’ve explored are wild and remote – lit­er­al­ly wilder­ness­es – while oth­ers are urban and indus­tri­al. Shoot­ing in chal­leng­ing cir­cum­stances is a fun­da­men­tal part of Erik and Sara’s cre­ative method. They research and plan shoots togeth­er, some­times walk­ing for miles until they find a spot where the con­di­tions are just right. Then they frame a com­po­si­tion, often inspired by ref­er­ences to art and sculp­ture. The sub­ject of a nude fig­ure in the land­scape, at one with nature, or expe­ri­enc­ing a sense of alien­ation in a built-up set­ting, serves as a metaphor for humanity’s wider rela­tion­ship with the envi­ron­ment as a whole. 

Erik Noppe is a Bel­gian pho­tog­ra­ph­er who began his career shoot­ing nature, dance and sports sub­jects, before turn­ing to mod­el pho­tog­ra­phy in 2010. His grand­fa­ther, Edgar De Geest, was a pro­fes­sion­al pho­tog­ra­ph­er and Pres­i­dent of the Nation­al Bel­gian Com­mit­tee of Pho­tog­ra­phers and Ere­deken van de arbeid (in Pho­tog­ra­phy), so pho­tog­ra­phy is almost a fam­i­ly tradition.

Sara Scar­let is an inter­na­tion­al mod­el, based in Bel­gium. In addi­tion to artis­tic and com­mer­cial mod­el­ling for 15 years, she has organ­ised her own tours and events, and appeared in short movies. She also advis­es oth­er mod­els on safe­ty, tour organ­i­sa­tion, social media, and brand build­ing. One of her goals is to have mod­elled on all sev­en con­ti­nents by 2028.