Even Ralph Lauren's Photographers have rough days.

[amolitor]

Unless, of course, we can work out some reason for it to be shot in this way on purpose. In that case, it could potentially be genius.

I think you're giving the photograph short shrift. On the one hand, yeah, it's pretty weird and maybe not all that. On the other hand, getting the cloth lit that well is a trick and a half. A GWC ain't gonna manage it, most likely. A GWC also isn't going to have the idea -- the GWC duplicates things he's seen before. No way on earth this came from some guy who's basically lousy -- there were skilled pros in action here.

This thing is DIFFERENT and NEW. Arguably it's ****ty, too, but man someone had a moment of clarity here and threw the goddamned dice, eh? Bold as hell, something you simply do not see from pros all that often.

Plus, it gets eyes on the page. We can argue that the photographic team did a lame job here, but reality is they presented a portfolio that had a lot more images in it. The PR/Marketing people at RL selected this one. Those ****ers are pretty damn high-speed/low-drag, and they picked this one out on purpose. It gets eyes on the page, it grabs your attention.