Answers on an Abbey Lee Kershaw postcard

kamel rachedi

She has been photographed by the best in the business. Now comes Abbey Lee Kershaw like you have never seen her before: as an illustrated postcard or greeting card, courtesy under-the-radar French illustrator Kamel Rachedi. This illustration has just popped up on Rachedi’s portfolio on online art community Red Bubble, where it's being offered as a postcard or greeting card (AUD 2.52) or one of various prints (AUD 18.00). And Kershaw isn’t the only supermod to have been sketched by Rachedi. Edita Vilkeviciute, Lily Donaldson and Naomi Campbell also feature in Rachedi's portfolio (that’s Vilkeviciute and Campbell, below, with the uncropped version of ALK). Rachedi does not appear to have a dedicated blog, but it's probably not a bad idea as the blogosphere has proven to be a tremendous springboard for emerging illustrators. Two cases in point: illustrator/bloggers Garance Doré and Danny Roberts, both of whose careers were launched via blogs.

Was Marion Hume fired from Vogue Australia for putting a black woman on the cover?

Naomi Campbell is never far from the headlines. On Sunday she managed to inadvertently embroil an Australian publisher in one. In a story headlined 'Editor sacked in racism row', Campbell told the UK Telegraph, "One time, I went to Australia. The editor-in-chief of a magazine there told me that she got fired for putting me on the cover. I do remember going there and saying, 'Where's the Aboriginal model? There should be one. They're beautiful women.'" No names are mentioned. But coincidentally, another Brit by the name of Marion Hume edited Vogue Australia for 18 months in the late 1990s, during which time she commissioned Peter Lindbergh to shoot Campbell for the June 1997 cover, above. In 1998 Hume was fired, following a controversial tenure, during which, it should be noted, she did not manage to stem the erosion of circulation and advertising that had begun prior to her appointment with the arrival of marie claire in 1995 and continued with the 1998 rebirth of Harpers Bazaar Australia. From 1995-1999 Vogue lost almost a quarter of its readers and two-thirds of its ad share. In 2002, Conde Nast withdrew from Australian publishing, selling the Vogue license to FPC Magazines, which in turn was acquired by News Limited in November 2006.