Sunday, May 9, 2010

The Progression of a Moment

I think by now pretty much everyone has already seen these pictures taken by Donald J outside the Dolce & Gabbana show. After all, they were posted several times on tFS. So you might be asking yourself, "why the heck is she posting these now?"

Well, I got an e-mail from Donald J with the images (hello and thanks Donald!), which made me take a closer look at these pictures that I had previously only taken a cursory glance at. And what I saw was the progression of a moment, made all the more beautiful and forlorn because it shows an antagonistic juxtaposition of a personal moment against a very public situation. If for some reason you're unfamiliar with Donald J, please be sure to check out his tumblr and his facebook. He has some really beautiful candids up.






I guess these images struck me harder this time because I could see a narrative and context. I'd previously seen them in bits and pieces, posted and reposted, rendered away from their context and each other. But aggregated together like this in a series, these pictures become so interesting. Perhaps I'm alone in feeling this way, but I don't get as excited by candids anymore. I kind of feel like if you've seen one you've seen them all. Yes Freja looks nice, oh look she's wearing black, but that's about it.

But with these I see personal and public spheres in conflict. A moment between friends looks oddly strange set against the chaos taking place outside of a show. Models are just regular girls (granted, with amazing genes) yet they increasingly live under more scrutiny from people like you and me, perpetuated by blogs like this one. Some might argue that this is the inevitable result of (and riffing off of Walter Benjamin here) living in the age of digital reproduction. But I still don't think it's necessarily fair that we judge their private lives based on small moments captured by cameras. So when I look at this progression of a moment I see a microcosm of all the issues and conflicts that fame and recognition bring.

I'm not really sure where I'm going with this...if anywhere at all. I guess it's just important to be cognizant of the constructs we take part in. And it's also important to remember that any picture we see is nothing but a small fragment of time, separated from both it's past and future. If we're lucky we'll get a progression like this, giving us some more substance to chew on; but most of the time we're left in the dark. And the danger comes when we don't realize it.

Sorry if you think I'm being too "contrived," or if you think I'm just making all this shit up. I guess I am....but aren't we all? Frankly it's why this blog exists. It's a way to help me understand the why and the how, instead of just settling merely for the who, what, where and when.

Image Credits: donaldj.tumblr.com, facebook.com/DonaldJPhotography

8 comments:

COCAMIA said...

Love Freja with red lips! Gorgeous!

Anonymous said...

I don't know if you have seen the video clip from Marc Jacob, but it elicited a vibe that was very much at variance with yours.

Anyhow, kudos to the photographer for being able to notice this tender moment between them amidst the bedlam that was the fashion world. It is moment like this that replenishes my passion for this vapid world.

Your post reminds me of the last stanza of Keats' ode, "Thou, silent form! dost tease us out of thought as doth eternity," which ends with that famous quote - or infamous in T. S. Eliot's opinion - about beauty. I suppose none of us are that naive as to believe in the rosy pictures that fashion is selling to us. Yet in this postmodernist world wherein the deities have lost much of their charisma, it is up to somebody else or some other institution to edify the spirits or at least keep us opiated.

DYQ

Anonymous said...

There is a video that goes along with these images:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndpT9JTw9H8

You can kind of see that Freja was aware of the cameras and thus tried to keep the moment brief. At least that's how I interpreted it.

SF said...

This has nothing to do with those lovely candids but how is Meg 'model of the moment' in another model's site? lol

Rrose Sélavy said...

^because I wanted her to be and because I could? :P

Niandra said...

I love your writing, Rrose. This is beautiful.

Initials.CC said...

Superbe !!!

CELINE&CHARLOTTE

Anonymous said...

i think i got why she's always wearing black...