Image Power
JING ZHANG EXPLORES THE DIVERSE ARCH OF FASHION PHOTOGRAPHY AT AN EXHIBITION CURRENTLY SHOWING IN SHANGHAI
On the walls of the Shanghai Center of Photography hang images from fashion-photography legends such as Paolo Roversi, Nick Knight, the late Peter Lindbergh, Ellen von Unwerth and Mario Testino. Their recognisable signature aesthetics and decades-spanning careers with campaigns, style magazines and hundreds of celebrities are testament to the cultural power of the fashion image. The fashion narrative, done well, can offer a compelling insight into the aesthetic aspirations within a certain social order.
Beyond Fashion, curated by Nathalie Herschdorfer, director of the Swiss Museum of Fine Arts Le Locle, showcases nearly 100 works from some of the industry’s biggest names, as well as the bright stars of a new generation. The exhibition charts the trajectory of fashion photography’s influence in a space founded by 0ong Kong photography legend and Pulitzer Prize-winner Liu Heung Shing.
Fashion photography created a new visual language beyond the clothing it originally served. There are some recognisable images that have worked their way into the modern creative consciousness – such as Lindbergh’s classic black and whites of the supermodels du jour frolicking on a beach in white shirts, or Glen Luchford’s shot of a young Kate Moss being playful in Times Square. Contemporary street-style shots of Scott Schuman (the Facehunter) marked the moment when street style (and then fashion-week street style) would really take off, the falling domino that would accidentally kickstart the whole fashion-influencer phenomenon.
Then there are other more artful works that came with more digital manipulation. Miles Aldridge’s saturated colours, graphic shapes and whimsical compositions for Vogue Italia, for example, have a mysterious filmic narrative. Koto Bolofo’s works showing the luminosity of skin tones on bodies get more powerful the longer you look. There’s the artful abstraction of Viviane Sassen and Ina Jang’s pieces, which read more like contemporary art than fashion photography. And some personal favourites include Elaine Constantine’s photos that lean towards an anthropological or documentary style rather than classic fashion photography.
The exhibit shows how far and wide the genre has moved, from the ultra-exclusive days of VIP couture salons into the golden age of reverence in pages of mass fashion magazines, which came to lead the visual culture of style, and eventually to the digital era we’re in now, where images travel the globe in an instant, available to everyone on addictive apps such as Instagram. Beyond Fashion also plays with the gendered nature of traditional fashion imagery that throws up questions of masculinity and femininity; and the male or female gaze.
While many of the top industry names in Beyond Fashion are predictably male of a certain generation, there are a few female counterparts. The likes of 7livia Bee, Coco Capitan and 1na Jang represent a more modern generation of female voices and lenses impacting this genre. Beyond Fashion is at the Shanghai Center of Photography until July 25