Sophie Dahl’s voluptuous figure was a wake-up call to the industry, while Donyale Luna, known as the first Black supermodel, broke boundaries when she graced the cover of British Vogue in 1966. Our definition of beauty has expanded exponentially from the days when it was defined by overwhelmingly white, size six supermodels. More empathy behind the lens has revolutionised the way we think and talk about models. Having more women behind the lens in the 21st century has helped make the sexualised tropes of men photographing beautiful women – high-heeled legs, eyes half-closed as if in submissive ecstasy – look dated and tired. The female gaze has begun to shift this power dynamic. Speaking on Desert Island Discs last year, Moss revealed she “cried a lot” on early shoots because she hated removing her clothes, taking Valium to ease her nerves when she had to be topless on set. Many images are now shocking for the red flags of abuse the world was oblivious to at that time. The role of women in the workplace, the sexual freedoms won, the political battles fought: all this is played out in front of the camera.īut fashion photography as a picture-book history of women is told mostly from the eye of the beholder. Polly Devlin, writing in the Vogue Book of Fashion Photography, notes that it is “a unique, valuable and extraordinarily detailed view of women … we see very clearly how women looked not just how they dressed, but how they desired to look, and were expected to look, and how they were looked at”. She heralded a changing of the guard, and the dawn of the age of grunge. In her first shoot for the Face in July 1990, Kate Moss turned the tables on the ostentatious wealth of the 80s in an instant. Katharine Hamnett at Downing Street, wearing her “58% DON’T WANT PERSHING” T-shirt – against the proliferation of US nuclear missiles in Europe – is made all the more delicious by the detail that Margaret Thatcher wears a polka-dot pussy-bow blouse, a perfectly matched duel of 80s power dressing.
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