Powerful film. Although ultimately I think continued growth in emerging markets will bring lasting racial diversity to fashion runways/advertising, not a change in morality.
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Having addressed the tricky, tricksy and often veiled subject of body size hand-in-hand with the equally inflammatory subject of feminism in his first Political Fashion film, Nick Knight now chooses to tackle the outright taboo subject of racism in the fashion industry. Despite increasing diversity throughout contemporary society, is is undoubtedly true that black models feature in fashion far less than their white counterpoints. Nick's film not only questions this, but as a fashion 'insider' takes the industry to task over one of the last arenas where racism is apparently a tacitly-accepted fact of life.
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In reply to Vikram Kansara:
Sadly I think the current climate has been much more conservative than the 70's, when Pat Cleveland, Iman, Beverly Johnson, were among more than a handful of topmodels of dark skin, and YSL used African models on his runways, Shiseido had a famous Japanese model for their international ad campaign, Antonio Lopez used many African models and Puerto Rican models for his artwork, and he introduced many of them to the influencial people of fashion. Fashion in the 70's had a very raw and refreshing energy. China is one country now where they like to use Asian models, but because China doesn't have their international fashion brands, many of their brands remain local only within China market, they are not able to push their influence of using more Asian models in the international fashion arena. I do find it surprising that there aren't more black models on the runway, as they generally walk well and have really good postures.
It was in the NY times where they did a special report on the Italian Vogue special issue using only African models for the editorials. The effort was appreciated, but, to do just one special feature, in a way has not addressed the condition of unequal opportunities in the fashion/modeling business; it has merely done a token gesture, because if fashion magazines don't start to use black models on more regular basis, in every issue, nothing in essence would ever change, and this issue concerns middle Eastern and Asian models as well.
In reply to KaWai:
I totally agree. The initiative was a much needed one, however I’m worried that the message didn’t get across in the true essence and that perhaps the all African issue was more of a "never been done before fad, a hot concept or whatever”. I always buy fashion magazines, but I’m getting frustrated with the lack of ethnic variety. I can’t relate to or gain any inspiration from the repeatedly used Beyonce and Rihanna pics where there skin tones are forever getting lighter and their hair texture is Caucasian. I have to turn to adverts such as Dark and Lovely ,that I pull out and keep for make-up tips because there’s barely anything out there.
It truly is incredibly homogeneous.
Like a lot of fields, giving people something different that they'd probably actually really want loses to timid and blind over-reliance on marketing research. It can even be self-defeating.
With fashion imagery it's:
Take the majority demographic of your target market, reflect their aspirational self (richer, thinner, prettier) and repeat ad nauseam.
The weird aspect of this is if everyone follows the same formula forever, then all it takes is someone to NOT do it and your brand is almost effortlessly differentiated. So what prevents them from doing it? Fear? Narrow-mindedness? Having your job on the line? I don't know. (Don't want to seem nonchalant or heartless about something I'm sure cuts people very deep, but I don't think it's racism. Not *true* racism anyway. I'm an 'outsider' so I concede I may not know what I'm talking about.)
American Apparel uses a broader range of ethnicity and sizes, and I highly doubt they do it out of altruism or political correctness. Why are they the only ones? The company seems to be growing quickly so it can't be working against them. What do they know that the others don't? Is it a younger market, with a different mindset? Did they just decide to do it their way, knowing that having a fresh and different image would work? Does their target market aspire to be urban hipsters rather then the usual aspirational stuff?
I'm not sure if using a 'black' model to glamourise and trivialise the use of guns (and showing a tank's gun as a huge cock) is the best way to tackle racism in fashion.
Nick, have you really tried to analyse what is going on in fashion with this issue?
You could go on strike and refuse to do a job if they don't let you use a black model.
In reply to Karl Fuler:
I kind of agree with you, the image of black person with gun-it's another stereo typed image, that's not going to change people's mentality. Fashion photographers definitely have influences on which models they could use, or could suggest fashion houses to use.
In reply to Karl Fuler:
Karl thanks for your comments.
I have tried the' going on strike ' tactic and all that happens is the job goes to somebody else and I no longer have any influence . Like all strikes it only works if everyone does it and sadly I can't see that happening in this industry.
I was so disgusted and shocked when I first came across this sort of accepted racism some 25 years ago that I really did feel like giving up . I decided to try and change things, for this issue and many others( size, age for example)the best way was to stay involved in the mainstream and continually keep the pressure up. Every time I could influence the choice of model I would.In that way I can have some effect and not just become marginalised.
It had a lot more effect to have a series of pictures of a size16 plus model published in Vogue than in iD for example . If change is going to happen it has to be in the mainstream.
As for the choice of imagery I wanted the video to be taken up on You Tube and be widely seen and as far as I am concerned it was a bit of "what ever means necessary" when it comes to getting the message across. I had to weigh this up against the obvious charge that I would be stereotyping and guilty of exactly what I am trying to stop.
I guess it is for you to say whether I made the right choice or not.
In reply to nick knight:
I agree with you that if change is going to happen it has to be in the mainstream. No one has enough influence to control the course of fashion. If people were to try then fashion would probably bend in the other direction.
Racism? I don't really think that it is a question of people in fashion disliking people because they have a darker skin colour - as I don't imagine they dislike those who are not very thin, or have acne. No, this is all about the real nature of fashion - something that you seem reluctant to address - something that you exploit to benefit yourself.