Snapping Toronto’s social landscape
29-year-old is elbowing his way into the city’s small pool of event photographers
On a nippy weeknight in March, in a bar in Yorkville that’s 105 in dog years, a natty congregation gathered.
For a swanky subterranean lounge that has seen its share of the beau monde since opening in 1999 — society progenies Galen Weston Jr. and Cleophee Eaton, celebrities Mick Jagger and Robert Downey Jr., and fashion folk such as Christian Louboutin included — the scene held up a mirror to the latest generation in town to colonize the place. Old hangout. New crop. And co-hosting this particular late-hour bash: one of its bandleaders, Ryan Emberley.
“A gentleman-photographer,” is the term he personally extends when asked to describe himself, during an interview held just a few days later at Soho House. Arriving in a long, swooshy camel-coloured overcoat, and with his hair slickly styled — his sidebar severe enough to get him into a touring production of Jersey Boys — the 29-year-old mused expertly on the role he’s carving out as the younger gen’s go-to snapper.
If there’s a gala, a launch or an opening, chances are he’s on it. And for those curious to catch up on some of the city’s parties of late (or, for some, just a chance to peer at photos of themselves), there is the recently rebooted image-happy website he commandeers the Compendium.
“I don’t want to throw around terms like Heir Apparent, but . . .” he gibes, allowing the cheeky ellipsis to speak for itself.
“I guess you could call it an uneasy peace,” he adds, furthermore, when asked about the delicate ecosystem of “event photographers” in the city. For some years now, the top dog has been George Pimentel, whose number is on many a socialite’s speeddial, and who also boasts an international profile, getting rare access to events such as the Academy Awards.
Ever-present, too: the happy-golucky husband-and-wife team of Tom and Aline Sander. The latter can usually be found in a sparkly something that might have come from Ginger’s wardrobe on Gilligan’s Island, as she herself sometimes jokes. Their forte is the fundraiser circuit.
And then there is Emberley, who with his relative youth and dimpled approachability, is increasingly elbowing his way in, too. Though there’s clearly enough social action to go around in a city this size, there is, unsurprisingly, some competition.
Among the dots on Emberley’s agenda, when we spoke: a party for designer Karl Lagerfeld, while he was in town, and another shindig coming up to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Bata Shoe Museum, on Bloor St. All still rather inconceivable to the boy who, when growing up, was diagnosed with “society anxiety” and spent at least a part of his youth having to go to regular sessions for troubled youth, à la The Breakfast Club. “I sometimes still feel it,” he admits, referring to the anxiety.
Destined with a rather peripatetic upbringing — he lived in 15 different places, including for a spell, in the French territories of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon, just off the coast of Newfoundland — he eventually went to Ryerson University for journalism and dabbled in television, working as a writer for E! News.
One thing leading to another, he began shooting parties about five years ago for JJ Thompson (who then ran the site that would become the Compendium), and ended up taking it over.
In a camera phone-mad society, where everybody is their own “event photographer” (not to mention broadcaster), Emberley says there is still demand for photographers who treat it like a “craft.”
“I tinker and I toy,” he says. It’s the kind of care that perhaps led him to the biggest gig of his career, last month: flying to Hong Kong to cover a ritzy fundraiser for amf AR (The American Foundation for AIDS Research). The pictures he took of some undeniable A-listers — including Gwyneth Paltrow and Victoria Beckham — wound up on Vogue online.
“I had missed Kate Moss on the red carpet,” he says, setting up the scene. So he tried to get her inside. Playing hard-to-get, she first said no, but then, just at that moment, Naomi Campbell floated by, and Moss ceded to a photo of both of them together. Snap. Snap. Emberley had snagged two for the price of one.
Of the celebrities he’s had a chance to shoot, though, there is only one name that gets Emberley truly elated: Stevie Nicks. Being the hugest Fleetwood Mac fan, he photographed her when she was in Toronto, doing an event at TIFF Lightbox last year. In terms of the local society swirl, philanthropist Sylvia Mantella, who’s always extra-catwalk-ready, tops his list of favourites. “And so sweet,” he says.
Tips for posing in photos? Emberley is only too happy to opine. For men, “no arms around women.” He won’t have it. “It looks too possessive,” he says.
For women, he does think there’s something to the “prune” technique first popularized by the Olsen twins — saying the word “prune” when smiling for photos to create a particular facial contortion.
“Prunes are not just for senior citizens anymore,” he says.
Meanwhile, put your drinks down, people: Emberley, like many event photographers, prefers to shoot people sans sauce.
Finally, the party-sprinter has one parting tip: “Know your angles.”