menstyle.it via fashionologie
Last month much ado was made of the decision by Australian Victoria’s Secret Angel Miranda Kerr to be photographed naked and chained to a tree on the cover of Australian Rolling Stone. Kerr, the face of the Australian Koala Foundation's 'No Tree, No Me' campaign, did it for the koalas, reportedly telling the magazine, “I feel strongly about the need to protect our natural environment because it supports our life -- it really is that simple". Well apparently the koalas have migrated to Brazil, because in a portfolio of images released overnight by Italian Vanity Fair, Kerr is naked again – along with two other topless compatriots, Catherine McNeil and Abbey Lee Kershaw, coincidentally all from Chic Management – posing nude in Brazil for Pirelli’s 2010 calendar. And the world’s most-famous girlie calendar takes on Carry On proportions this year, thanks to photographer Terry Richardson, who has made a career out of his risqué – and even sexually explicit – imagery. Warning NSFW.
The shots revealed so far of Kerr and Kershaw seem relatively demure compared with some others.
Notably, one shot of Hungarian Eniko Mihalik with Richardson, in which the pair appear to both be simulating fellatio with bananas. Another shows Brit Daisy Lowe standing next to Richardson whilst spraying herself with a hose - which is being held by Richardson just in front of his groin, suggesting the hose is his penis.
And moreover, the shot of Mcneil (above) standing in what appears to be a rubber plantation, whilst pouring a cup of of rubber milk down the front of her body.
Yes we all know what Richardson is implying the rubber milk could be.
The image is reminiscent of Richardson’s famous shot of South African model Josie Moran for Italian fashion brand Sisley, in which Moran simulates fellatio with a cow’s udder:
terryrichardson.com
The heterosexual porn innuendo is interesting, given that by all accounts McNeil’s sexual preference is for women, not men.
But look, frockwriter is sure that all the models were paid a lot of money to do this calendar. And at the end of the day, apparently that's all that counts to the models and their agents.
Come Christmas however, Kerr might want to keep the calendar under wraps when she is due to unveil her new book aimed at motivating and inspiring teenagers.
Unless of course Kerr renames the book, which is currently called Treasure Yourself, as Pleasure Yourself.
all four images above: menstyle.it via fashionologie
Richardson likes to blur the boundaries between art and porn in his fashion imagery and he is paid handsomely by the industry to do so.
Richardson was paid $200,000 for one Lee Jeans campaign in Australia in 2006 - a campaign which caused a minor furore at the time.
But there is nothing soft porn about Richardson’s personal work, which includes explicit images of himself having sex with a variety of women, some of them reportedly his assistants, and some of them ostensibly aspiring models.
That’s all well and good and civil libertarians would argue that Richardson, a recovered heroin addict, is entitled to express his art in whatever means he likes. Provided of course the models he uses are over the age of 18. On his website, Richardson specifies that models need to be 18+.
Even Barack Obama appears to endorse Richardson, because here he is shaking the photographer's hand:
terryrichardson.com
Frockwriter would hazard a guess that if Obama was fully apprised of the extent of Richardson's oeuvre, he would not want either of his daughters anywhere near Richardson.
High profile New York womens blog Jezebel recently published a link to a Guardian story about the new Picture Me documentary made by model Sarah Ziff.
The documentary recounts a number of alarming incidents. There are accounts of models as young as 14 being pressured into nudity on fashion shoots. One model claims she was sexually assaulted whilst working on a fashion shoot.
In a separate incident, Sena Cech tells the filmmaker she attended a casting session for which she was required to strip and then touch the genitals of an unnamed male photographer - who by that stage had also removed his clothes.
Cech says she did as she was asked and was subsequently offered the job, but turned it down. She was never offered work by the same photographer again.
It is not clear if Richardson was interviewed for, or is even mentioned in, the documentary.
However Jezebel chose to illustrate its story with a cropped version of this image of Richardson enjoying a hand-job. The provenance of the image is unclear. It may be part of Richardson's 2004 book/exhibition Terryworld (linked above).
Jezebel’s clarification noted that the image was used because Richardson himself had once glibly noted the following in a public domain interview:
"It's not who you know, it's who you blow. I don't have a hole in my jeans for nothing."
Many are no doubt wondering just who Sena Cech's unnamed photographer might be.
As indeed some are wondering if Sarah Ziff, who is now a fulltime student at Columbia University, could be yet another candidate for Jezebel’s anonymous model blogger Tatiana - who, coincidentally, penned that post.
terryworld/taschen
But the Picture Me revelations may merely scratch the surface of a much wider problem in the fashion business.
Frockwriter recently raised questions over some unsettling imagery which appeared on the UK Ponystep website, involving a series of young male models in Calvin Klein underwear. The story was picked up by BlackBook and Jezebel.
We have since heard some disturbing allegations about precisely what some young male models claim they have been required to do on some major fashion jobs.
Just to clarify, none of these allegations involve Terry Richardson.
But they do involve at least one other high profile male photographer.
For the moment, noone is willing to go on the record.
