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subscribe to style file blog via RSSAnja Rubik: Let’s Talk About Sex
May 21, 2012 11:46 am
It may not come as a surprise to those who have seen her work gravity-defying wonders in an Anthony Vaccarello gown slit just about to her sternum, but Anja Rubik isn’t shy about sex or sexuality. And now, with her relaunch of 25 Magazine, she’s creating a forum to talk about it.
Rubik has been involved with the magazine since 2009, when she and then-boyfriend (now-husband) Sasha Knezevic signed on to work on the Viennese title, but she’s since taken full editorial control and rebranded the glossy in the image of Viva, the Bob Guccione-published erotica mag targeted at women, which ran from 1973 through the end of the decade. But mere smut it isn’t; the new issue, shot entirely by women, features photos by Inez van Lamsweerde, Annie Leibovitz, Ellen von Unwerth, and Paola Kudacki, whose “Heroes of 25″ series is pictured above.
Calling in from her native Poland—between shooting in London and jetting off to Cannes, where on Wednesday she’ll launch the magazine with a party at Pierre Cardin’s manse Palais Bulles—Rubik spoke with Style.com about sex versus sensuality, men versus women, and the lessons she’s learned as a newly minted editor. Key among them: Don’t fear the nipple.
Tell me about the vision for 25.
I had the idea because I really loved the magazine Viva from the seventies, which was a Penthouse publication for women. I loved the vision of it, and that was what formed the inspiration for me. 25 is basically directed toward very strong-minded, ambitious women, who are very comfortable with themselves and their sexuality. I was thinking a lot recently and looking how sex is approached nowadays, and nudity, and bodies. Erotica kind of disappeared. The way we approach sex is either really prude or very vulgar.
What will be in the new issue?
Every picture that’s in the magazine is shot by a woman. We have incredible photographers, like Inez [van Lamsweerde], Emma Summerton, and Katja Rahlwes. Annie Leibovitz donated pictures. Ellen von Unwerth. Basically, the magazine consists of beautiful images. It’s less of a magazine, more of an album. And in general, 25 is more than the magazine. We were trying to create an identity, to do a lot of projects connected to it. We’re doing one with Net-a-Porter that will launch quite soon. We did a video with Barnaby Roper and Kanye West that will launch at Colette. It’s a whole lifestyle, a whole vision.
Were there editors you looked to for inspiration or advice? Or other magazines?
I had a lot of references from past magazines, and Viva was the very big inspiration. [But also] Playboy from the seventies, Penthouse from the seventies. And of course editors, yes, Carine [Roitfeld] was a big inspiration as well. Fabien Baron is incredible; I think he has an incredible vision, so clean and minimalistic, that influenced the magazine as well. But I didn’t want it to be too clean on the other hand, because the inspiration was the seventies, and the magazines in the seventies are very far from that. It was a bit of a struggle. And I don’t want it to be taken too seriously. There’s a lot in it that has a sense of humor, a wink.
Do you think men and women approach sex differently?
I think it’s definitely different. In general, I think women approach it in a more sensual way, and a more personal way than a man. A man looks at it and thinks is it sexy or not. A woman will look at every little detail and more of the feeling of the image rather than is the girl sexy. For a woman to take a sexy picture, it takes way more than for a man.
Read the rest of this entry >
tags: 25 Magazine, Anja Rubik, Annie Leibovitz, Anthony Vaccarello, Ellen von Unwerth, Fabien Baron, Inez van Lamsweerde, Paola Kudacki, Sasha Knezevic
James Franco: Rebel’s Rebel
May 8, 2012 6:06 pm
James Franco is busy. So busy that the only time he can speak is by phone at 7:30 a.m., before business hours for most of us, and an appointment not necessarily made more palatable by a night at the Met gala the evening before. No matter. “I don’t like to waste anything,” Franco says, minutes as well as creative outlets and even press calls. It helps to explain how the relentless multitasker finds time to do it all: shoot major Hollywood movies (next up: the title role in Sam Raimi’s Oz: The Great and Powerful, cameos in the latest from Harmony Korine and Seth Rogen’s directorial debut, etc.), direct his own student films and get them distributed (The Broken Tower, a life of poet Hart Crane), model for Gucci, create ads for Seven for All Mankind, occasionally host the Oscars, curate The Dangerous Book Four Boys (now also available in book form, from Rizzoli), and so on and so on.
Franco’s latest project, Rebel (sponsored by Gucci and Seven), arrives thanks to L.A.’s Museum of Contemporary Art, at JF Chen’s exhibition space in Los Angeles next week. For this meditation on James Dean—whom he won a Golden Globe for playing in 2002—and Rebel Without a Cause, Franco commissioned artists Paul McCarthy, Ed Ruscha, Aaron Young, Korine, Terry Richardson, and more to reinterpret bits of the film and its attendant legends. (His own take on it, Brad Renfro Forever, screens as well.) Not long after sunrise, Franco spoke with Style.com about an evening at the Met, fashion versus film, and the enduring rawness of Rebel.
Rebel runs May 15 through June 23 at JF Chen, 941 North Highland Avenue, L.A., for more information, visit moca.org.
Thanks for speaking so early. I can imagine it was a late one last night.
It was pretty late. But my date was Marina Abramovic, and she is going to Cuba today, so she wanted to leave early. So I didn’t stay out that late.
How was the Met gala?
It was fine. It was my first time. It’s just a nice dinner, with every celebrity you can think of.
Did you get a chance to see the exhibition?
Yeah, they kind of walk you through it when you get there. It was great. It was all women’s fashion, which I guess I can appreciate.
Fashion definitely seems to appreciate you. How do you see it fitting into what you do?
I see it as one more aspect of the world that I’m involved in. I think a lot of what I do, in whatever medium it might be, is grounded in my experiences as an actor on film. That’s how I enter the professional world, through film. I’m used to certain working methods and collaboration with a lot of people. I’m used to making projects with people that are skilled in different areas. I’m used to coming up with ideas and then having them augmented through collaboration, or hearing other people’s ideas. So fashion is basically, like, the wardrobe department on a film, but for life—for our characters in life.
The companies I work with are very supportive of the art projects that we do, and in the other direction, we’ve been able to incorporate the clothes from Gucci or Seven into the art projects in a way that I’m really happy with. It’s not as if one side takes precedence. There’s something really important about that. It’s not like the art world, or the stuff I do art-wise, related to Gucci doesn’t critique fashion or make fun of it or anything—it just sort of uses the clothes as a wardrobe designer would on a movie. With fashion…they don’t force me to create a false image of myself to sell the clothes. Basically, who I am is what they want. Read the rest of this entry >
tags: Gucci, James Franco, Seven for All Mankind
Deep Frieze: London’s Premiere Art Fair Arrives In New York
May 3, 2012 1:42 pm
If you’ve got the resources to buy contemporary art—or the admirable envy suppression to spectate as others do—it’s a good week to be in New York. Sotheby’s and Christie’s contemporary art evening sales commence next week, and beginning tomorrow, London’s Frieze Art Fair arrives for its first-ever New York residency, setting up shop on Randall’s Island, where upwards of 25,000 people are expected to descend. Frieze’s tireless directors, Matthew Slotover and Amanda Sharp (he, London-based; she, New York), have not only corralled 180 galleries for the event; they’ve also commissioned sculptures for an outdoor sculpture park; audio works for a sound-art program; a speaker series; a slate of on-site performances and projects, including a reconstruction by John Ahearn of his 1979 exhibition South Bronx Hall of Fame; and pop-up restaurants, cafés, and food trucks from art-world hangouts like Sant Ambroeus, the Fat Radish, Roberta’s, and the Standard. On the eve of the fair, Slotover spoke with Style.com about New York versus London, the fair and the gallery, and fashion’s enduring fixation with the world of contemporary art.
Frieze Art Fair runs May 4 through 7, 2012, on Randall’s Island, NYC. For information, tickets, and more details, visit www.friezenewyork.com.
Frieze in London is a huge and well-established event. How is New York going to be similar or different? Are you conceiving of it as quite separate, or will it be modeled on the original?
Well, I mean the great thing about having the Frieze in New York is that there is so much else to offer in the city. You know, there’s museums and galleries, and restaurants and bars and everything. We’re really working with galleries [outside the fair], too. There’s an event Saturday night in Chelsea, there’s something Sunday night on the Lower East Side.
Frieze’s co-director, Amanda Sharp, lives in New York; you live in London. How do you see the art scene differ in New York versus London, in terms of appreciation and in terms of buying?
That’s a really good question. One view of the issue is that in London you’ve got like 500 people in the art world and 500,000 people, the general public, who are interested in art. In New York, you have 5,000 people in the art world…but the general public is not as interested in art. I don’t know if that’s true; I go to museums here and they seem pretty full to me. But I think certainly there’s more galleries, there’s more collectors, there’s more major museums here, but in London we have had this massive general public kind of uptake on contemporary art, which is reflected in the media. There might be a subtle difference in that. [But] essentially, they’re two very important art cities, and those in places we always enjoy doing fairs, because they’re just incredibly cultured cities, with a lot to do. They’re attractive for people to come to, and there’s a great informed public there. They probably have more similarities than differences. Read the rest of this entry >
tags: Frieze, Matthew Slotover
Her Family Is Famous For Diamonds, But Gaia Repossi Is More Inspired By A Feather Through The Nose
April 30, 2012 2:38 pm
In recent years, the jewelry house of Repossi—founded in 1925 and nearing its 90th birthday—has won over a whole new generation of fans. Credit goes to Gaia Repossi, the 26-year-old artistic director, who took over her father’s post in 2007 and quickly introduced her own style as well as collaborations with friends like Joseph Altuzarra and Alexander Wang. (Her pieces made Style.com’s Top 10 Jewels list for Spring and Fall 2012.) All this despite protests that she’d never enter the family trade. “I was very intellectual, in my little own world,” Repossi said on a recent visit to New York to toast her ongoing partnership with Barneys. “I rejected completely the jewelry world.” But after studying painting, anthropology, and archaeology, Repossi edged into the business by the side door, as it were—she initially wanted to focus on its image and marketing—and wound up giving it a timely overhaul. “I wanted to bring it closer to what jewelry is nowadays to me,” she says, “and maybe also what jewelry was missing.” She spoke to Style.com about her work, her studies, and her art. For the record, she still paints.
Tell me a little bit about your background, and how you came to work for the family business.
It’s a little bit unexpected, even if it seems expected. When you grow up you can have two reactions: You can be very keen on what your parents are doing, or you want to look for something else. I was absolutely not willing to continue to work as my dad did [at Repossi]; I strictly wanted to do something different. I was painting as a teenager and I was aiming to really focus on that as my career. I started studying painting and I finished doing archeology, because I wanted to go more in the past, in the civilizations and the history of art. In the meantime, while I was in Paris studying, I saw a few things I didn’t like in my dad’s image of the company that I wanted to touch. Slowly it came out, the idea to launch a collection. And it worked, without even thinking about it. Unconsciously all my studies and my own imaginary world started applying to jewelry.
For example…?
It’s like, you go to India and see the nomads with garlands of silver things that they consider cheap, but they are extremely elegant. Nowadays, women don’t know how to wear the jewelry anymore, but when you go in India, there’s people barefoot but they are extremely elegant with all their jewelry. There are some codes, there’s an aesthetic that inspires me and has me working, a lot more than this [European] lady with her beautiful diamonds, even if she is elegant. It’s more that those silhouettes are striking. In Africa too—in Congo with their combs, and in Amazonia with their feathers in their nose.
Your anthropology courses proved to be good training.
Exactly. I was studying anthropology—ethnic similarities in between the civilizations. Even in those classes, jewelry became very important. Sculpture, too. When I go to shows, they have patterns, it’s the same. [But you also need] the family and the background that knows how it do it in a very refined way, because there’s no point to making a sculpture [for jewelry]—it has to be wearable and refined, not a heavy object you don’t know what to do with. Read the rest of this entry >
tags: Alexander Wang, Barneys New York, Gaia Repossi, Repossi, Vanessa Traina
Grace Yourself
April 13, 2012 4:51 pm
“We are the most unfamous famous band in the world,” says Grace Potter, front woman of Grace Potter and the Nocturnals, over the phone from her room at the Rivington Hotel in New York (she was in town to perform at Christie’s auction earlier in the week). “It takes people a second to figure that out that they know us and then they will hear one of our songs and say, ‘Oh my God, that’s them?’ ” Gracing TV and movie soundtracks from Almost Alice (the companion soundtrack for Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland) to One Tree Hill will do that for a band. Tomorrow, Potter and the Nocturnals take the stage for their Coachella debut, which should help put a face—and, as it turns out, a pair of McQueen heels—to the sound. On the eve of their debut, the fashion-savvy singer spoke with Style.com about stage outfits, crotch shots, and Tom Ford sunglasses.
What designers and labels are you especially attracted to?
I have been traipsing around in a lot of McQueen lately. I wore McQueen to Lollapalooza last year and McQueen shoes are actually really great for festivals—surprising I know, but comfortable. The guys in the band are big into AllSaints, it’s such a great no-brainer brand for us. AllSaints really fuels our fire. Also, I just picked up an Alexander Wang bag with rose gold accents that I am going to be rocking at Coachella.
What else do you have packed for Coachella?
I always pack too much for festivals for sure. You never know when the weather will change and you have to be prepared for anything, so you need everything from a raincoat to a bathing suit. This record we are coming out with is moving more in the direction of duality, playing against type. My look at Coachella, without divulging too much, is going to play against what people want to see at Coachella. They use Coachella as this opportunity to go crazy and wear feathers and look super weird. I love that because I’m a hippie, but I want to go for a more of Katharine Hepburn on acid look this year.
What does that look like, exactly?
I’m aiming for great lines and tailoring in blazers, lots of separates. Lanvin makes some really great pieces like that. Inevitably, you will get hot and you will want to take your clothes off and be naked. I love how Lanvin can deconstruct and look really elegant so it’s perfect for that. I also have this Wayne bomber-slash-blazer jacket—I chased it down after I saw it on the runway at the show in New York—and I plan on throwing it on when it gets cold at night. In terms of sunglasses, I am actually legally blind so I have a hard time with glasses because they don’t carry my prescription. But I am a Tom Ford sunglass girl, I can’t help myself. Read the rest of this entry >
tags: Alexander McQueen, Alice in Wonderland, AllSaints, Bonnaroo, Coachella, Grace Potter, Grace Potter and the Nocturnals, Lanvin, Lollapalooza, the Black Keys, Wayne
Gilded Age
April 12, 2012 5:09 pm
Only five years since its founding, Gilt Groupe has a strong claim on the hour of noon. At 12 p.m. EST, Gilt’s online-only sales offer discounted designer merchandise to an invite-only crowd that now numbers in the millions. What began with fashion, accessories, watches, and jewelry has grown to include travel, food, full-price menswear, and more. Co-founders Alexis Maybank (left) and Alexandra Wilkis Wilson are still at the helm, and this week, they publish By Invitation Only: How We Built Gilt and Changed the Way Millions Shop. The two spoke with Style.com about the company then, the company now, and where “the store in your pocket” is headed to next.
Give me the capsule history of Gilt Groupe. How did this all come about?
Alexis Maybank: Alexandra and I actually met in college, but it was really about five years later, in graduate school, where we spent the most time together. Two years after business school is when we started working on the concept of Gilt Groupe. Gilt Groupe came about as a work of five founders; it was a series of ideas, or “aha” moments if you will, that brought us to the idea that became Gilt Groupe. So for one, one of our co-founders, Kevin Ryan, spent a lot of time in France with his wife, who is French, and noticed a similar model starting to take off over there and thought this could do well in the U.S. Alexandra and I had always popped out of our offices in midtown to jump into friends-and-family invite sample sales—Zac Posen or Fendi or whatever it might be. And we loved that, and rain or shine seemed to make it to them. We took that passion and excitement for the sample sale, the little-known event that was hard to get access to but had a frenzy appeal once you got there, and thought that this could be something fantastic to take to a broader audience online.
The high fashion world is typically quite closed and hard to infiltrate, and has been, at least in the past, resistant to the idea of online. Did you have to convert people at the outset to get people involved?
Alexandra Wilkis Wilson: Of course! When we launched November 2007, many of the brands that we were working hard to convince to sell with us, many of them didn’t even sell online for full price, forget about at a discount.
AM: The process of convincing brands was [Alexandra's] full focus; today we work with over 6,000 brands, and the majority she convinced to come on. But at that time back in 2007, if you remember, there were very few places online to shop for luxury goods. It was not just convincing them that going with Gilt and doing it in the environment they’re offering and making them comfortable with the nontraditional aspect of the site, showing the beautiful kind of editorial aesthetic that we were bringing to sell their product on models, with makeup, with a full look and design, was really appealing to them. But Alexandra really was first kind of educating on selling on the Internet and e-commerce and what it could do before we even started talking about Gilt Groupe. It was almost like a two-stage process with every brand we spoke to. Read the rest of this entry >
Where Marc Jacobs And Louis Vuitton Meet
March 9, 2012 4:59 pm
This year, Marc Jacobs celebrates 15 years as the creative director of Louis Vuitton. And today in Paris, Louis Vuitton—Marc Jacobs, a comprehensive exhibition that explores two innovators and their roles in Vuitton’s 143-year history, opens to the public at the Louvre’s Musée des Arts Décoratifs. (If you can’t make it to Paris before the September 16 closing date, Rizzoli’s accompanying tome, with historical and critical essays by curator Pamela Golbin and Jo-Ann Furniss, a look back through the collections organized by Jacobs and Katie Grand, and more, arrives in April; it can be preordered here.)
“When we were talking through the project, what came out was we really wanted to portray Louis almost like a black and white picture, whereas Marc is like a Technicolor film,” said curator Pamela Golbin, a celebrated author, fashion historian, and the Chief Curator of Fashion and Textiles at Les Arts Décoratifs. The exhibition is divided between a historical view of founder Louis Vuitton himself and a contemporary view of Jacobs’ creation of the house’s ready-to-wear, which he founded in 1997 and has stewarded since. Here, Style.com talks to Golbin about creating the exhibition and the history of the influential house.
What does this exhibition say about the development of Marc’s career at Vuitton?
First of all, what’s so interesting about this exhibition is that it follows two men, so it’s about Louis and he has a whole floor, and then also a second floor is dedicated to Marc. When it came to Marc, it was important for him to be very involved in the project. I did not want this to be a retrospective; it’s more a celebration of what Marc has done in the last 15 years at Vuitton. And it’s incredible that it has already been 15 years. The exhibition is more about the vision that he created for the brand than anything else. And that vision is quite large. It’s not just about designing clothes. Obviously accessories are important, but so is advertising, his artistic collaborations, and just his overall cultural vision. So Marc’s floor begins with Marc’s World. We essentially opened up his head and we did a self-portrait of Marc through all of the cultural influences that he’s had and that he uses for his design process. So it’s like a giant Tumblr page with still images and video images of everything and anything that has influenced him over the years. It’s not at all chronological. It’s thematic. And he even came up with the titles for each of the cases.
Why did you want to steer away from doing a retrospective?
The idea was by no means to say, “OK, in 1997 he did this and he did that.” His story is not chronological. His story is really about an energy and an attitude. He turned Louis Vuitton from a brand into a house. And so what we tried to get across were the steps that he took to get there and important moments. And more importantly, just really his fashion vision for Louis Vuitton that, when he arrived, was already 143 years old. He really created a fashion entity within a luxury brand. Read the rest of this entry >
tags: Emma Winter, Faye McLeod, Joseph Bennett, Les Arts Decoratifs, Louis Vuitton, Marc Jacobs, Pamela Golbin, Richard Prince, Sam Gainsbury, Stephen Sprouse, Takashi Murakami
The Dos And Don’ts of A.P.C.’s Jean Touitou
February 22, 2012 9:49 am
Having made his name on some of the planet’s best jeans, A.P.C. founder Jean Touitou is expanding into the glamour business. In December, he tapped former Azzaro designer Vanessa Seward for a capsule collection of high-end womenswear that the two will debut in Paris during the upcoming fashion week. All this as he continues to expand his global retail empire: He was in New York last week to preside over the opening of his third NYC store, in the West Village, before jetting to L.A. to continue his search for space. At A.P.C.’s Soho showroom, Touitou sat down with Style.com to discuss the things he won’t do (red-carpet dressing, celebrity shilling, open in Abu Dhabi), the things he will (keep his clothes largely logo-free), and why everybody should stop dressing like a rock star already.
A.P.C.’s West Village store is open now at 267 W. 4th St., NYC, (212) 755-2523.
During Paris fashion week, you’ll show your upcoming capsule collection with Vanessa Seward. Will it be an ongoing collaboration?
We’ve been thinking about it a lot. It’s a lot of work, and it’s too [much] for us. So I’m really happy I did that, but I think it’s going to be one thing. I might have the will to do more, to ask my studio to do more—it’s delicate—feminine pieces. Because our trademark for women is a bit of frigidity of design. Don’t get me wrong—it’s an idea of frigidity.
It’s a strictness.
It’s a strictness, which I believe is sexy, but you might want to play with sexiness in a different way, like the way we did with Vanessa. And maybe when it’s over, maybe we’ll continue to have some dresses like this. Read the rest of this entry >
tags: A.P.C., Jean Touitou, Vanessa Seward
Marina Abramović On Her Own Life—And Death
February 13, 2012 5:32 pm
It takes a particular kind of person to stage not only their life, but also their death. But performance artist Marina Abramović is that special kind. She had already created her biography twice—first staged by herself, ten years ago, then by theater director Michael Laub—but for the third iteration of The Life and Death of Marina Abramovic, the artist put herself entirely in the hands of another artist: avant-garde legend Bob Wilson. Wilson accepted, and his The Life and Death of Marina Abramovic debuted in Manchester last year. To add yet another level of scrutiny to the process, Wilson invited photographer Tim Hailand to photograph a day in the creation of the piece, now published as One Day in the Life of Robert Wilson’s The Life and Death of Marina Abramovic. The piece had grown to include an original score, performed by musician Antony of Antony and the Johnsons, and starred Abramović herself along with Antony and Willem Dafoe. Last night, Abramović’s longtime friend Ennio Capasa of Costume National hosted a party for the book and introduced a related film installation by Giada Colagrande. To celebrate the occasions, Style.com spoke with Abramović about the process.
Tell me a little bit about the creation of The Life and Death of Marina Abramovic. How did you and Bob Wilson come together? Had you collaborated in the past? How did you work together?
I met Bob Wilson for the first time in 1971 in Belgrade. At that moment, I didn’t meet him personally but saw his play. It left a very strong impression on me. During the late seventies, I met him personally and we became friends. For me, Bob Wilson invented a new language of theater, introducing a new sense of time, and this is very connected to my work. When I was having the idea of making The Life and Death of Marina Abramovic, I asked him to direct it. He was the only person I had in mind. Working together was an exercise in giving up control. I gave him all of my material and just became a tool for him to work with.
And Antony?
Antony, I met six years ago when I saw him sing at Rufus Wainwright’s Carnegie Hall Christmas concert. It was a mesmerizing experience, and he was the only person I wanted to create the new music for this piece.
Were there moments from your own life that you particularly wanted to revisit for the performance? Any that you considered but chose not to?
No, it was all Bob’s choice and all his editing.
How does fashion play a role in your performances?
Fashion plays a big part of my private life, not at all in my performance. I don’t use designer clothes for my work—I make them myself, or they’re just very simple. In my private life it’s different.
I’ve heard that you recently purchased a house in New York with Riccardo Tisci. Is this correct? Will you both be spending more time in the city? Will you be collaborating at any point in the future?
I don’t want to speak about Riccardo’s plans without his permission, but he is a close friend, and we have already collaborated on a piece together in Visionaire, called “The Contract.” I think we will continue to inspire one another creatively far into the future.
tags: Bob Wilson, Costume National, Ennio Capasa, Marina Abramovic, The Life and Death of Marina Abramovic, Tim Hailand
The Image Makers: Deborah Turbeville
February 6, 2012 3:30 pm
In a new series, Style.com sits down with the best in the field of contemporary fashion photography to talk about both the process and the product. Here: Deborah Turbeville.
Considering the high romance of Deborah Turbeville’s work, it might seem odd to think of her as a little bit punk rock. But to hear the 73-year-old photographer describe her untrained, just-go-for-it DIY beginnings, comparing Turbeville to Sid Vicious doesn’t seem so far off. “There would be a strange cropping or one girl in focus and three out or a blur,” she said at a recent interview at her Upper West Side apartment. “But I would end up liking the mistakes and incorporating them into my work.” Well, and there’s also the time she got arrested in Texas with Bob Richardson, with whom she worked with regularly while a stylist at Harper’s Bazaar.
It was actually Richardson and his “cinematic” way of working that precipitated her eventual leap from fashion editor to fashion photographer in the early seventies. (She also had encouragement from Richard Avedon and Harper’s Bazaar art director Marvin Israel.) But even though she’s shot editorials for Vogue, Italian Vogue, and W and campaigns for Barneys New York, Oscar de la Renta, and Valentino—for whom she did the current Spring campaign—Turbeville still bristles at the F word of fashion. It’s one of the reasons it’s taken her so long to put out her most recent book, Deborah Turbeville: The Fashion Pictures ($85, www.rizzoliusa.com). Style.com caught up with Turbeville to talk about being Claire McCardell’s fit model, what’s so great about St. Petersburg, and the very Hollywood shoot for her new Valentino campaign.
PLUS: Click here for a slideshow of Turbeville’s work through the years, accompanied by commentary from the photographer >
Why do The Fashion Pictures now?
I have difficulty with realizing that’s what I’m supposed to do. [Laughs.] I don’t really think of myself as a fashion photographer. I’m kind of in denial about it. People kept saying, “You should do a book of fashion pictures. We’d like to see them, after all.” A friend of mine was doing books with Rizzoli, and he said, “You know, that would be a fun little airy project, to do something on my house in Mexico.” I knew I had a lot of photographs hanging about. So I made an appointment to go in to see Charles Miers, the publisher, and he said, “I’ll do the book, but would you also do a book on your fashion pictures?” And that’s how it happened.
They did a nice job. I like the scrapbook format.
Well, the book is really a way to show how my work developed. How it all started. It goes chronologically. It just shows more or less the progression of my work. It’s a bit autobiographical. And I always do that anyway, putting pictures together in a narrative way.
It’s funny, I never realized that your first job was working for Claire McCardell for three years.
Yes, I was a fit model but I also did the shows. But because I had such a long waist, it was hard for the other models to fit the clothes. In the end, she said, I’m going to fire you and hire you back as my assistant. So I was very happy. She was one of the few designers who would use a lot of European fabrics. She used incredible fabrics. She was really a Renaissance woman. She designed shoes for Capezio. She was probably the first one to put girls in flats, in ballet slippers. We all wore flats. Or we wore tiny little heels that were stacked, made out of lizard. She did jewelry, this Chanel kind of jewelry. She was like the Chanel of the United States at that point. It was an incredible learning experience. Read the rest of this entry >
tags: Bob Richardson, Deborah Turbeville, Diane Arbus, The Image Makers, Valentino
