USHER. Captured by Kenneth Cappello. Philadelphia, Fall 2004.
“The chicks like Usher, but you don’t see him flaunting chicks. I guess he was married for a long time. I just thought it would be cool to put him in this context that I’ve never seen him in: Women like this dude; let’s put him in between a girl’s legs. I don’t know if Jonnetta, his mom, would be happy, but it made sense to me. The girl was a random model who shot for editorial for GQ, but they never used that shot. I was looking at the print and I was like, ‘This looks like where Usher should be.’”

Usher photo by K. Capello featured in RESPECT #2 published 2010.
About Kenneth Cappello
While working as a “drunk barback,” he “began building sets as a hired carpenter for this guy named David LaChapelle,” he shares. “I had no idea how huge he was when I got hired. I got onto his set and was like, Oh, shit, this is where photos come from—this is a photo studio, this is a stylist, this is where photos are made. That really cracked my head open to take what I had always done just as ‘this thing’ to another level.”
RESPECT.
You might also like
More from News
SLAUGHTERHOUSE Exclusive! Throwback to The Movement!
RESPECT. Exclusive! Assassination Day! Shady Records’ Slaughterhouse Counts down to The Release of Welcome to Our House. [Straight From The Crate...Originally Captured for RESPECT. …
Murder Was The Case: Looking Back 18 Years at the Legendary Soundtrack starring SNOOP DOGGIE DOGG.
Today we pay RESPECT. to one of Hip-Hop's greatest soundtracks — Murder Was the Case — based on a short film …
How GORDON PARKS Documented the Prosecution & Punishment of Crime Shaped by Race, Poverty and Power
RESPECT. Magazine Proudly Endorses The Gordon Parks Foundation's Exhibition: "The Atmosphere of Crime" What do we mean by “crime” in America? …