Which magazine commissioned melania trump's 1995 nude photoshoot and why was it published later?
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Executive summary
Melania Trump’s nude pictures were shot for and originally appeared in the French men’s magazine Max (a now‑defunct publication commonly described as a French men’s or “adult” magazine) during the mid‑1990s, and the images resurfaced and were republished by U.S. outlets during Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign amid a mix of journalistic, commercial and political motivations [1] [2] [3]. Questions about the exact timing and whether the shoot took place in 1995 or 1996 — and which issue carried the images — led to corrections and competing timelines from the photographer, the New York Post and others [4] [5].
1. Which magazine commissioned the shoot: Max, a French men’s magazine
Multiple contemporary accounts and later reporting identify Max magazine — described in coverage as a French men’s publication that is now defunct — as the magazine that published the spread containing the nude photos of Melania Knauss (later Melania Trump) [1] [2] [3]. News outlets quoting the photographer or archival evidence pointed to a French outlet and specifically to Max, and industry databases and gallery sites that repost the images likewise attribute them to Max Magazine’s mid‑1990s issues [6] [7].
2. When and where the photos were taken: contested but tied to a New York shoot in the mid‑1990s
Photographers associated with the session have said the shoot happened in Manhattan and was produced by French photographers working to place images in European men’s magazines as part of a modeling career push; many outlets reported the session as occurring in 1995 [8] [7] [3]. However, reporting later flagged inconsistencies: the New York Post initially reported a 1995 shoot for a January 1996 Max issue, but the Post’s timeline was corrected after the photographer said he misspoke and the photos actually ran in a 1997 issue, which aligns with Melania’s stated arrival in the U.S. in 1996 [4] [5]. CNN and other outlets covered the dispute and noted the photographer’s own statements that the session may have been unpaid “exposure” work typical of models then [5].
3. Why the photos were published later — resurfacing during the 2016 campaign
Although the photos appeared in Max in the 1990s, major U.S. republication came two decades later when the New York Post and other outlets republished the images in July–August 2016 as Donald Trump was the Republican presidential nominee, turning a decades‑old modeling spread into front‑page material with immediate political salience [2] [3]. The timing reflected a potent mix of tabloid sensationalism, perceived news value tied to a candidate’s spouse, and the commercial incentives of high‑profile campaign coverage; outlets licensing or running the pictures framed them as newly uncovered or newly relevant to readers at the height of the campaign [1] [3].
4. Motives, disputes and alternative explanations
The photographer who has been identified in reporting said the shoot was “a celebration of the female body” inspired by Renaissance art and framed it as standard modeling work for exposure, while other sources stressed that such shoots were common for European men’s magazines and not inherently political [8] [3]. Critics argued the Post’s decision to use the photos in 2016 was partisan or sensationalist, and legal/immigration advocates used the timeline discrepancy to probe or defend Melania’s immigration narrative, prompting public corrections and statements from lawyers and spokespeople [4] [5]. Melania and her representatives later defended her modeling as artistic and emphasized restrictions on “full nudity” in some licensed photos, illustrating competing reputational and legal frames [9].
5. What the reporting cannot conclusively resolve from the provided sources
The assembled sources agree that Max magazine originally published the photos and that U.S. republication peaked during the 2016 campaign, but they do not provide a definitive single archival citation (such as a specific Max issue image index) within the provided materials to settle every date discrepancy; the precise day of the shoot and the magazine’s internal commissioning paperwork are not in the cited reporting, and where the photographer’s recollection changed, outlets corrected their timelines accordingly [4] [5]. Those gaps explain why journalists and advocates reached different conclusions about whether the shoot preceded or followed Melania’s move to the United States.