Julie Bullard - Nadia Lee Cohen / Martin Parr

Julie Bullard - Nadia Lee Cohen / Martin Parr

The new IDEA book is JULIE BULLARD, a work of photographic fiction by Nadia Lee Cohen andMartin Parr. And, yes, you read that correctly. Nadia Lee Cohen (Women, HELLO My Name Is, the Kim Kardashian Christmas video) has teamed up with Martin Parr (The Last Resort, The Cost of Living, over 100 more books and no Kim Kardashian videos) and they have indeed made a book.

Martin is Nadia’s favourite photographer. She likes his work so much she wanted to be in his pictures. To be more precise, Nadia wanted to be a character in a Martin Parr photographed book. She wanted to beJulie Bullard.

The actual Julie Bullard was my childhood babysitter and possibly the first woman I ever saw in real life with naturally blonde, curly hair. She was my first introduction to glamour in any form. I was starstruck. Memories of her clothes, hair, makeup and home represent the essence of Britain in the 1990s and, for me, there was no one other than Martin to photograph the fragmented re-creation ofthat fondly remembered warm environment.

And so Martin signed on to take the photographs in the way only he can:

It was a nice surprise to be invited. I was intrigued to join her on this journey of childhood memories, and to try and capture that sense of innocence.

The book is designed as a late-seventies photo album. It is very closely modelled on an example acquired from eBay, complete with faux leather spongy board covers and a vintage gold metal spiral binding. The photographs are classic Martin Parr – only the subjects have been stylised. Julie Bullard (Nadia Lee Cohen), her sister Jane (played by Scarlett Carlos Clarke) and her mother, Sharon (Frankie Park), all have familial prosthetic noses. The sets are dressed, the characters costumed, the food prepared – it is a full- on fantasy of a very real looking world.

The photographs are better than you would expect to find in a family album. They are Martin Parr pictures after all! They are perfectly pitched, however, as a faux documentary. Over the course of the album, a story of an entirely fictional, yet believable, life emerges.

• Spiralbound hardback with padded leather-imitation covers
• and gold foiled title
• 22.5 x 16.5cm
• 128 pages
• Edition of 2,500

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IDEA is a London based bookstore and publisher who have previously released Nadia Lee Cohen’s Women (in its now sixth edition), HELLO My Name Is and Women (Pirate Edition) as well as the Martin Parr book with Gucci World (The Price of Love). IDEA and Dover Street Market recently celebrated 20 years working together – a collaboration that saw the installation of a fully operating kino cinema built by Nadia Lee Cohen for a previous Photo London event.