The brief was to create the full-scale artistic direction for every aspect of Justin’s sixth studio album, Everything I Thought It Was, and to collaborate directly with the artist to realize that direction. Through conversation, we created our own brief together: reflect on a long, beautiful and challenging career, and do so in an artful, symbolic and surreal way. The objective was simple: give audiences the quality they deserve across all touch points, and to build a world around this album that authentically delighted ourselves and the artist equally. To put even more simply: to make art.

The art direction for the album’s photography is the basis for all album packaging, promotion and live performance. Our visual world begins in the desert, a visual metaphor for journey, solitude and reflection. There we find Justin alone at a gas station in the middle of nowhere—we don’t know if his car has broken down, if he’s in need of gas, is about to make a call at the payphone, or simply get a cup of coffee. Everything seen in every image is a well-referenced symbol. Here in this world, he encounters a second, much larger version of himself. This surreal change in scale, much like a Magritte painting, forces the audience, and Justin, to question which one is the real Justin. To achieve this, we built the desert setting at multiple different scales in order to visually build this surrealism.