Adin Taylor and Kye D'Arcy get their Grindr on

adin taylor in 'brief encounters' via interview magazine

Modelling is an increasingly popular career option for men, including more and more Australians, as documented by this blog. In some cases - as recounted to frockwriter - it is not without copping a vigorous ribbing from some of their peers that the profession is a little, well, 'gay'. Indeed, one young male model mentioned that he turned up at his local sports club one day to find his modelling photos plastered all over the walls. You have to wonder what the locker room would make of this designer underwear spread just posted by Interview magazine, which depicts two dozen young male models - including Australians Adin Taylor (above) and Kye D'Arcy (below)  - pretending that they are taking shots of themselves for the infamous gay cruising app Grindr.

For the uninitiated, Grindr is a phone app that directs men to other available men in their immediate vicinity. 

Launched by LA-based Joel Simkhai in 2009, the company touts itself as "the largest and most-popular all male location-based software out there". Others have called it a "21st Century digital bath house" and "a penile GPS". It boasts some 4million er, members, in 192 countries, including Olympians - so many of whom reportedly simultaneously availed themselves of the service shortly after arriving in London late last month, they crashed the Grindr servers.

The Interview spread, entitled 'Brief Encounters', appears to be a web exclusive. 

Sure, fashion is all about theatre, role-playing, satire, social commentary and artistic expression and sex is not an unusual theme. And at times fashion imagery has certainly courted controversy. One case in point, Steven Meisel's 'Dogging' spread in 2008, which portrayed a group of young models simulating sex scenes in a forest. 'Dogging' is a British term that refers to the phenomenon of voyeurs who engage in sexual activity in outdoor areas. In spite of the fact that there was no nudity or explicit imagery, it was reportedly all too much for Vogue Italia, which had originally commissioned the shoot and the images wound up running in V Magazine in the US instead. 

All of the models in the Interview spread are, we believe, well over 18. And just as well, of course, as Grindr has a strict over 18 policy - which nevertheless failed to prevent one Grindr member from pleading guilty last year in Canada to the sexual assault of a minor. 

However it has to be said that, regardless of their chronological ages, around a quarter of the cast of this Interview spread look like teenagers. The kind of teenagers you'd see hanging around infamous Sydney beat The Wall - a mix of gay and straight kids hocking their asses to pay for a drug habit. 

We wonder why the editors did not choose a more manly cast. It's not like there would not have been a vast array of mature male models out there to choose from. 

all images: interview magazine