Love me or leave me to die is the name of Iouri Podladtchikov’s blog. His posts are mainly photographs of women. Some are expressing sadness, others a lust for life – and all are young and beautiful.
These women are posing for Podladtchikov the photographer. Well, actually, for Podladtchikov the snowboarder. But what may appear to be a distraction is actually the perfect complement to his sport.
Marco Bruni, Podladtchikov’s coach, puts it like this: “If Iouri’s career ended tomorrow because of a ruptured ligament, by the day after tomorrow he would know what he wanted to do instead.”
Ursina Haller, one of his team mates, explains: “Occupying himself with photography is part of Iouri’s strategy – it’s his way of taking the pressure off his sport.”
Podladtchikov himself says: “You are most likely to succeed in a situation where you have nothing to lose, where you are standing at the starting line, knowing you don’t need to win.”
Some athletes see this the other way round, and say they perform best when they feel as though their whole life depends on the outcome of the competition. Iouri, however, says: “My life won’t come to an end after my snowboarding career finishes. I want to keep up the same momentum.” So, just as Shaun White is trying to widen his horizons by playing music and recently becoming the owner of his own sports product line, Podladtchikov is trying his luck as a photographer.
Although he is already dedicating every minute of his free time to photography – and sometimes also the odd minute that he could be investing in his sport – the hobby is actually helping him to recognise himself as an athlete, perhaps for the first time in his career. Podladtchikov was always reluctant to refer to himself only as a snowboarder, as he didn’t feel this description reflected him as a whole. As a result, he was constantly on the search for something to complete him, starting new projects and then getting another idea 24 hours later and starting something else. Now that he has found photography and is receiving growing acclaim for it, he finds it easier to accept the happiness that sport brings him.
However, he is well aware that for the time being any recognition he is gaining as a photographer is coming first and foremost from his fame as an athlete. “There are thousands of good photographers out there who just don’t have the opportunities that are available to me,” he says. Two years ago, for example, he was able to exhibit his photos – mainly of women and his travels – in Zurich. He is also the face of camera manufacturer Leica, and last spring his snowboard sponsor hired him for a photo shoot for a clothing line. The images were presented in an exhibition at a boutique in December. In attendance were his friends and many tall, slim, elegant women. Around the same time, the hip and well-respected American fashion and art magazine Milk Made published six of his photos, along with comments by him on each image. And whenever he attends the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Days in Zurich, as he did in November, it is not unusual for him to be approached by the marketing head of a big car brand who wishes to express admiration for his attitude to life. Iouri responds by saying that is the greatest compliment he could receive, and the next day he is sitting in the front row of the catwalk.
And so it happens that in an interview where he should be discussing sport, he ends up talking non-stop about a “new star in the Swiss fashion sky”, as he puts it, the 15-year-old Vivienne Rohner who has blown him away with her captivating walk. “Other people just walk from A to B,” he gushes, “but she walks along the catwalk as if she were walking through her life.” Suddenly you realise that he is actually talking about sport. Podladtchikov wants to glide across the halfpipe with the same bewitching movement that he found so beguiling in this model. He talks about the demands that models face. Some of these models have become girlfriends of his, and some of his girlfriends have gone on to be models because of him. He talks about designers, “those psychos”, and the brutality of the world these women live in – standing in the spotlight, starved and practically naked, completely open to attack. Without realising it, he starts talking about himself, about the demands of his sponsors and how they put him under pressure. “I let them know if I don’t agree with something,” he says. “Fortunately I am in a position to do that, because they want me to be on top form, and I am only on top form if I don’t have any obligations.” Eventually, his own train of thought leads the conversation back to the 15-year-old who “doesn’t give a damn” what the designers put her in. “She just walks along the catwalk, and that gives her an immortal beauty.”
Other times he comes for an interview and raves about the camera that he has just bought, or about his dream of moving to Paris once the Olympic Games are over. “I will not feel totally fulfilled until I have lived and been a photographer in Paris,” he says, expressing his view of the city as one big romantic fantasy. At other times he talks about how he hasn’t had any time to train because he had an idea for a new photo series, “and when I get something in my head, I have to get started straight away and organise everything that I need for it.” For example, he needed a pot of paint and a samurai sword for his latest project, Vulnerable Power – a dichotomy that forms a constant part of his life. In one of the photos, we see a woman with black painted breasts holding a paint brush; another photo shows a naked woman holding a sword between her legs. In both instances, the women’s heads are out of shot. “Faces would have been too personal,” he says.
Podladtchikov takes photographs because he finds it enriching to capture people’s beauty. He favours women in his photographs because he sees women as “the essence”. But he also explains that viewing life – and women – through a lens brings him a greater understanding of himself, as women in general make him feel insecure. “Women and my love of women – this is the root of most of the doubt in my life.”
Podladtchikov may seem like something of a player or a heartbreaker at times, but in truth he is just as often the victim. He explains that he has real difficulties with women, and that his relationships always fail. That said, his longest relationship – with a girl from his sports school – lasted three years, and his last one took him to London and back some 30 times in one year. He wonders whether he tries to impress women too much. “Would they be more interested in me if I just concentrated on myself?” On a different occasion he says: “I don’t think women like it when men bend over backwards for them.” He pauses to think. “But I don’t want to love like a robot; I want to love like a bird – a bird that, in its frenzied flight, only narrowly avoids crashing against the window pane, whee!”
And then it becomes clear why Podladtchikov’s friends and trainer hope that he doesn’t fall in love before the Winter Olympics – a fear Podladtchikov himself also understands. “When things are going well with a girlfriend, I’m on cloud nine. But when it’s not going well, I hit rock bottom, and all my energy disappears.” And if that happens, well, “fuck”, he may as well not even bother going to Sochi.
Now we understand what he means by “love me or leave me to die.”