Looking at glossy magazines, people believe that models have everything: fame, beauty, huge money or nothing but stupidity and vicious habits. Where is truth and where is fiction?
“Politics and the modeling business are two of the biggest myths that mankind has invented,” says the shocking fashion model Danila Polyakov. But if everything is irrevocably clear with politics, then the modeling business leaves a lot of questions. Looking at glossy magazines, people believe that models have everything: fame, beauty, huge money, or, conversely, there is nothing but stupidity, narcissism and vicious habits. Where is truth and where is fiction? About the most common myths of the modeling business.
Danila Polyakov.
Myth 1: all models live a glamorous life
Will Anderson, a New York photographer, began to debunk this myth. His models from "Apartment 301" live in the scenery of Gorky's play "At the Bottom" (a tiny apartment is a space partitioned off by sheets, in which at least 10 models huddle at once). They sleep, drink, eat and wait - all the time waiting for the phone to ring and the voice on the other end of the line will offer them a million dollar contract. Former fashion model Anderson finds his craft colleagues in a wide variety of poses, catches them in the most mundane activities (brushing their teeth, playing the guitar), as if making it clear that the difference between the world they are all so eager to get into, and the one from which they just came out just doesn't exist.
Myth 3: all models are perfectly beautiful
“I often hear words like 'beauty,' 'good looks,' 'chiseled facial features,” says another character in Zulander, the model Hansel. Having defeated his rival not with beauty, but with pressure and charisma, he once again proved the eternal, like the world, truth: in the modeling business, ideal beauty means nothing (or almost nothing).
Karl Lagerfeld and his model Baptiste Giabiconi. Of course, there are designers who are ready to bow before their model, see in her the crown of creation and turn a person from flesh and blood into a myth (a living example is Karl Lagerfeld and his model Batiste Giabiconi). Most photographers and fashion designers do not like to deal with an ideal cast in bronze, but with a unique set of traits from which they, like the ivory Pygmalion, can create something new every time. A prime example is Kate Moss and photographer Corinne Day. It is this couple that belongs to the largest, by the standards of the modeling business, the debunking of the myth of ideal beauty. A beauty that can hide in the folds of school uniforms, the curves of a semi-developed figure and childish facial features. Corinne realized this as soon as she saw 15-year-old Kate hurrying to the school bus. And after the release of The Face magazine with Kate on the cover, the whole world understood it. “I then had crooked legs, uneven teeth and a wrong nose,” admitted Kate. However, this did not prevent her from taking the place of a fashion icon, pushing back the canon models of the past.
The Face with Kate Moss.
Myth 4: all models are starving
Rumors of anorexia in models were confirmed in 2006-2007. after the deaths of Brazilian fashion sisters Lisel and Eliana Ramos, Anna Reston and Israeli model Ilanit Elimelech. Never before has the modeling world been so close to abolishing size zero and establishing new parameters. The organizers of the Italian fashion week have imposed a ban on participation in the shows of models with low body mass index (BMI). However, this method did not take into account models whose thinness was hereditary - and such, according to model statistics, turned out to be the majority.
Anna Carolina Reston. Incredible, but true: no matter how busy the models are, in their busy schedule they will definitely find time for breakfasts, lunches and dinners. Notes about the "lack of breakfast and round-the-clock cuisine" in one of the hotels formed the basis of Sasha Pivovarova's diary. And the rhetorical question “Where is the food?” Posed by model Jacqueline Jablonski, as well as the list of dishes she ate during the day (scrambled eggs and cappuccino, yogurt, almonds, a glass of vegetable mousse, chicken sandwiches, cookies and some champagne) formed the basis of a recent article in Harper's Bazaar. Gisele Bundchen put an end to this story. “Just as a car needs gasoline, so our body needs food. I eat because I don't want to pass out on the runway,”she stated on the Entertainment Tonight television show.
Myth 5: all models are gay
The myth that all male fashion models are gay originated from the same offended female model who once dressed in a backstage of the N brand in a motley crowd of other models, among whom were men. “Imagine,” she later complained to familiar models, “instead of looking at me, they were staring at their own body!” There was no limit to the indignation of the models. But they didn’t suspect what the opposite young men had thought of themselves a couple of minutes ago. Their own sugary kisses, caressing gestures, and general gaiety made them think of "just one thing." Unbelievable, but true: most of the rumors and gossip about models are gladly spread about themselves by the models themselves. And the long-standing confrontation between models of different genders, where girls get everything (more fame, money), and boys get nothing (rare units achieve success), makes them look like parallel lines that do not intersect. “The rumor about gay models has gone down in the history of the modeling business as the biggest delusion,” they say about each other. And then they find themselves alone with their own problems: “You wake up alone, get on a plane and go through customs alone, your phone does not work and you don’t even have anyone to talk to.” The inability to maintain long-distance relationships with loved ones and the lack of privacy are some of the most common problems that young models face when far from home.
Myth 6: all models take drugs
This myth was implicated in the "heroin chic" of the 90s and its iconic figures: the vicious nymphet Kate Moss, the little giant of the big photo David Sorrenti, who died of an overdose at age 20, and his miraculously escaped girlfriend Jamie King, Calvin Kleine with his scandalous ad Obsession and even President Kennedy with his devastating speech on the dangers of heroin. And although the "heroin chic" was abolished, its traces go deep into the history of the fashion business, and the remnants ricochet until today. The world cinema also contributed to this. Thanks to him, we are ready for the hundredth time to look at the languid, all in opium rings, Verushka from Antonioni's film "Magnification" or at Gia Carangi from the film "Gia" who has completely dissolved in love for the heroin. “It's all in the past,” some will say. But what about drugs in the modeling business now? “I've heard about drugs in the modeling environment, but I've never seen them,” says Cindy Crawford. Famous photographers Patrick Demarchelier and Peter Lindbergh agree with her: "It's impossible to be successful and addicted to drugs at the same time", "A model's job is to look great 12 hours a day." In the minutely scheduled schedule of modern models, there really is hardly time for a lunch of a leaf of lettuce, a boiled egg and a glass of Diet Coke, let alone more serious liberties! The model world, which has survived the decline of the era of supermodels, replacing one model with another in no time, will simply not allow such liberties.
Gia Carangi.
Myth 7: all models are fabulously rich
The myth that models don't get out of bed for less than $ 10,000 is a thing of the past with the era of supermodels. The exceptions are the models in the top ten of Forbes, led by Gisele Bundchen and closed by Carolyn Murphy. All others, even those who are the beauty and pride of the authoritative rating models.com, do not waste their fees. Many of them still remember the days when they just started their careers and lived in a foreign city on $ 75 a week, borrowed by the agency. Although the difficult times are behind many of them, the question of making money is still considered awkward and somewhat secret. So, the most famous Danish fashion model, the star of all world catwalks, Matthias Loridsen, when asked: "What is your income?" at first he smiles innocently, and then shyly asks: "Can I skip this question?" The Russian model, the son of the famous actor Alexander Lykov, Matvey Lykov, is much more frank: "I get $ 1000 for a show in Europe." For comparison: in Russia, fashion models receive $ 70-80 per show, and an income of $ 1,500 per month is considered the ultimate dream. For those aimed at the West, the work of a model is increasingly becoming a way to earn money for an apartment / car or study at a prestigious university.
Matvey Lykov. Afterword: The myth that Russian models are popular in the West is pure truth. The mysterious Russian soul, found under the ideal shell of Slavic appearance, flawlessly affects designers who are desperate to see a muse and co-creator in the model. “I love the smell of rain. It reminds me of a house. It reminds me of my childhood in Russia,”says Matvey Lykov in an interview with Western journalists. And the modeling business, discarding all its stereotypes, tells him: "I believe!"
