Outlined by the shadows of hotel room decor, he awakens from an evening of tête-à-tête. You are ruminating over an earlier conversation featuring Mediterranean comfort food as he prys your lips away from a bottle of merlot—a stunning improvement from the previous night’s trick. When executed well, representations of masculinity can be both savory and sweet. This fall, Josh McNey proffers a reflection of this dichotomy with “Olympia: Volume I,” the first in a three-volume monograph on the beauty of American masculinity, published by Casa de Costa.

The photographer succeeds in building upon the legacy of erotic male capture found in Bruce Weber’s “Chop Suey Club” and in Bruce Bellas and Bob Mizer’s representations of bare male musculature. The 140-pages receive inspiration from attractive and well-developed young men, colloquially regarded as “beefcake,” and highlight actor Joe D. Martinez—as a cowboy in one instance and entirely nude in another—throughout the continental United States, including New York, Las Vegas, and Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania.

Based out of New York and Los Angeles, McNey works bi-coastally as an artist and creative director. A native of California and former US Marine, he attended Columbia University.

“Olympia: Volume I” is now available for online order and in select bookstores worldwide.