H. R. Giger’s Dark, Erotic, Experimental Polaroids

By Alison Nastasi

July 5, 2014

Just months ago we said goodbye to Swiss painter, set designer, and sculptor H.R. Giger. The artist is best known for his design contributions to Ridley Scott’s Alien and his dark, erotic, biomechanical drawings. It seems Giger’s photographs are no different. Publisher Antenne Books recently released Polaroids (spotted on Neatorama), a collection of unpublished photos from Giger’s personal archives. These are the images he used as references for his work and to document his progress, but they also became experimental artworks in their own right (he scratched and drew over many of them) and captured the relationships he had with other artists — including longtime collaborator Debbie Harry. “Casual and light in their approach, the photographs intimate sex, death, pop, and his inscrutable sense of humor. They provide a view into a corner of Giger’s world that until now had remained largely overlooked,” the publisher tells us. Take a closer look in our gallery.

Photo credit: H.R. Giger, Polaroids

The music video for Debbie Harry’s debut solo single from her 1981 album KooKoo was directed by H.R. Giger. He also appeared in the video wearing a mask, miming the male vocals on the track. The artist also created the metal headband Harry wore.