Oh Tavi, I love you and want to adopt you (or at least hire you to dress me). Tavi, for the unfamiliar, is the Style Rookie, a 14-year-old fashion blogger who describes herself as a “dork that sits inside all day wearing awkward jackets and pretty hats.” She is, at first glance, entirely adorable. And at second glance, she is entirely brilliant and uncomfortably talented.
And she has some problems with Terry Richardson.
Terry Richardson, for the unfamiliar, is a fashion photographer whose aesthetic is, basically, naked chicks. Some number of those naked chicks actually did not really want to be naked, and have come forward to say that Richardson is actually really predatory. For his part, Richardson says, “At first, I’d just want to do a few nude shots, so I’d take off my clothes, too … I’d even give the camera to the model and get her to shoot me for a while. It’s about creating a vibe, getting people relaxed and excited. When that happens you can do anything. I don’t think I’m a sex addict, but I do have issues. Maybe it’s the psychological thing that I was a shy kid, and now I’m this powerful guy with his boner, dominating all these girls.”
Nice, right?
Tavi’s post links to a bunch of Terry’s photos, so click over there if you want to see them — the link to Tavi’s blog is safe for work, but the links to the photos are not. If you don’t actually want to look at Richardson’s shots, know that they’re basically variations on the same theme: Naked chick, often with a clothed dude.
Tavi writes:
Sometimes, Terry Richardson includes himself in the photo. Sometimes, the model’s face isn’t even there, but I won’t describe the bloody details. And it’s his personality (signature tattoos, signature facial hair, etc.) that gets the spotlight while all the girl has representing her personality is her ladyparts. Or, in this case, the spotlight is on the girl, but he still has to get in there somewhere, and make his “hey dudes, look what I got!” claim.
I think we’re supposed to find significance in how ironic and funny it is, because, Ha-ha! There’s that Crazy Dude Terry with his signature glasses and flannel and perviness again! Ha-ha! That Terry, what a Crazy Dude, with his signature glasses and flannel and perviness! Again! He’s become this weird cultural icon whose “thing” it is is to be a perv. In these kinds of photos where he’s included, he’s the real model, and the girl who was hired is merely his prop, his trophy, a nameless, faceless girl that accentuates Crazy Dude Terry’s image but doesn’t get an image of her own.
When Terry isn’t in the photo, it’s usually a naked girl posing with a guy who is Doing Something, or at least dressed like he’s about to Do Something (he’s in a suit, or smoking a cigar, or whatever, which she’s… naked). He took the notorious do-over photo of Sean Lennon and one of his model girlfriends, which was meant to emulate the original John and Yoko Rolling Stone cover — and of course the woman was naked instead (NSFW). But even putting aside the constant lady-nudity in his photos — and like Tavi, I don’t have a problem with nudity, I just have a problem with how it’s done here — Richardson uses some questionable methods to prompt that nudity.
And yeah, I know that it was said that Richardson sometimes gets naked and lets the girl take pictures of him before they let him take nude pictures of them. But this isn’t him being fair, it’s a strategy. It’s manipulative, it’s scary, and the last thing someone wants when they feel pressured into doing anything sexual is for the other person to suddenly be wearing nothing but tattoos. It’s supposed to, y’know, relax everyone, but there’s a difference between putting on a smooth jazz album while preparing some nice ginseng teas and, um, being naked, all of a sudden, in an uncomfortable person’s face. Of course, I can’t decide Richardson’s motives for him, but I might guess that after he gets naked for the girl, the girl is supposed to feel like she owes him something, even though she never asked him to get naked, but, you know, I might be overthinking things.
Sounds about right.
Now, I’m not implying that he harassed anyone for some of these photos I’ve linked to above, because I can’t assume that. Actually, I received an email from the woman he photographed for The Journal, letting me know she fully consented to the photos, and a friend of hers emailed me as well and told me she was 21 or 22 at the time of the pictures. So, again, this is just looking at these photos and breaking them down into the message they give people. (And don’t give me “Shouldn’t you expect that kind of behavior from him then if these are his photos?” because if you expect that from someone then there is something really WRONG about the way that someone does their job.)
On another note, I love all these magazines that claim to give out pro-women (but not feminist, because that’s a scary word!) messages yet publish photos from a misogynist who takes advantage of women. Do not misinterpret that as a Blogger vs. Magazine thing. Nor should you interpret this whole thing as a Tavi vs. Terry Richardson thing. I’m not writing all this because I want to embarrass him in an immature, spiteful, gym locker room prank kind of way. I’m writing it because it has to be written about and I want other people to write about it because he has to know that next time he tries anything along those lines, people will write about it. Then maybe he will stop doing it.
I’m glad girls like Tavi are the future of fashion.
H/T Kate.