After nights spent sailing on the milky way, looking straight forward and trying desperately to kiss the horizon line, I fell down on the ground at five in the morning wondering where I was and what countries I visited during this virtual trip. The circus of life hadn’t stopped, hadn’t waited for my poor self to strike back. I just needed something nice, nice and soft, a tea-spoon of sweetness not to feel bitter, half a pound of peace of mind… when I found this editorial above was still waiting for me (unlike the circus I was just describing a few lines earlier). Here I am, slightly happier as I get now the opportunity to share Inka’s and Neele’s newest story, just out in Elle Japan. Nothing seemed fancier than a bunch of white teeth biting a bright red apple, nothing tasted visually sweeter than a sunglass glimpse. I just felt slightly more alive touching base with reality again. If my eyes had fingertips, I’d caress it immediately.

And who cares if I remain in my loss, if I cross the sight of the abyss or keep exploring the darkest depths of what we’re too used to call our world. Here is only brightness, just as light as the rest seems heavy. Alena Eliseeva musing for Patrizia Pepe’s latest catalogue. Just as many colors as there is grey around, as much energy as there is that horrendous apathy squeezing our most positive feelings. If something drips out of all these few lines, is how much of a precious gift the fact we own our eyes is. All the art is in the way we use them to escape from reality, the best (barely) legal psychotrope out there. Everything around is a pure mystery that can’t be saved and we’d rather forget, bury somewhere under a blooming tree.

]]> http://www.eskimo.fr/blog/?feed=rss2&p=5321 0 http://www.eskimo.fr/blog/?p=5317 http://www.eskimo.fr/blog/?p=5317#comments Mon, 29 Apr 2013 11:20:59 +0000 Alexis Heim http://www.eskimo.fr/blog/?p=5317

Anastasia Sviridenko in and on Elle Slovenia, portraying and even embodying the upcoming idleness of a new season just born these days. A wonderful cover above, four time as much pleasure right below and a tad of wicked poetry as the most suitable ending.

Spending five years at the helm of Fashion Does It Better was a priceless experience to understand (and, especially, practice) the importance of image as a whole. To remember there is no physical separation between the materials that represent an achievement (editorials, covers, campaigns) and those just crafting a model’s overall image (portraits, polaroids, candids) — those just telling the naked truth and showing the soul and spirit behind the gloss. That’s why I picked a few raw shots of Ksenia “Nova” Malanova, after posting several magazine features and her two recent breathtaking runway appearances (namely Alexander Wang and his Paris counterpart Balenciaga). If her peculiar beauty and signature style would be understandable from absolutely every photograph, even hidden under pounds and litres of heavy make-up, facing it without artifice remains the best way to get it under your skin and let the chill run wild on your backbone. In other words: spread the love and share the thrill for what’s left to come soon.

The clash between pastel tones and bright touches is about as strong and visually dazzling as the contrast between Magdalena’s fragile, freckly pale skin and her flamboyant hair. If not the clothes themselves, this color scheme could be interpreted as the main theme of this editorial from Vogue Ukraine (possibly the ‘Vogue to watch’ this year) and it’s only a very simple background that photographer Alexey Kolpakov and stylist Julie Pelipas have chosen to create (and enhance) these simple yet strong visuals.

Wouldn’t be the first time I drop a few lines on the connections that develop between a model an a creative or a brand. And one of these previous texts took for example Magdalena Jasek and Valentino, the unusual way she embraces both the name’s timeless appeal and recent renewal. This time, I’m highly tempted to make it shorter for practical reasons but it’s certainly not that detail point that changes the deal: if MF Fashion wants to celebrate Valentino and naturally hires Magda among other young sprouts on the right slope, it’s certainly not by messy luck. Yeah, there is quite an army of models (I’ve seen it written bevy somewhere online but army sounds way fiercer, right?) and, yeah again, she’s not standing alone, captured in the middle of luxury garments by Pablo Arroyo. But the single fact of her presence there says how much it becomes hard to dissociate their names these days, how their respective aesthetics are currently one of the best matches in fashion. I hate to be too fast calling one this or that, but if there is a royal path to what’s safe to name a perennial favorite, she’s just right on it.

I bet I’d make you swallow the idea this image comes straight from another brand new editorial but I have to let you know I’d literally fool you doing so. And since the first of this very same month is long gone already (fashion wise), it’d sound pointless to bake you some late-blossoming jokes. This headshot of Vlada actually crossed my sight while looking for the best picture of Miss Roslyakova’s appearance at Christian Dior’s Spring 2013 Couture show in Shanghai, held earlier this month. You may know I don’t really have a soft spot for classical catwalk views then imagine what meant such a stylish visual arriving right in time to illustrate the event. An enigmatic zest of black and white meets the right angle to capture Vlada’s trademark (shoulders back to let the rythm flow under her skin), and pretty much emphasis on that delicate neck of hers. If photographs were all taken this way, the job of writing runway reviews would quickly turn into some daily delight.

Behind shy smiles and mellisonant laughters hide the tyrant, and beyond the shadow of the tyrant shines a merry bunch of pastel lights. You may repeat all over again that what you see shall be what you get, reality is often trickier but not necessarily less happy — whenever happiness makes sense. Too far on the wrong path? Got no clue! And don’t think I’m tired of feeling misunderstood! This huge story from italian edition of Grazia is about comic strips and led us to another world, a patchwork of unreal situations stuck together thank to as many colorful glues.

Instead of translating all the ohs, the ahs, the jeez and the awws (literally impossible) or babble about the tweeds, the jeans and whatever bubble gum bees, I thought messing around the same Inka and Neele Hoeper do on paper was a brighter idea. At the end of a good day, when the laptop screen shines brighter than a million stars (MIA because of an army of clouds but forgiven thank to the rain’s sweet smell), I couldn’t have dreamt awake of a better series to write about. When everything seems to drive free on a lovely slope, cheerful visuals are just the most brilliant metaphor ever to turn the page (and look forward) instead of closing the book for good.

Funny to do it this way: one day Inka, one day Neele. There is always a Hoeper sister to talk about and, while they aren’t sharing the same page this time, the type and level of job is quite as similar to each other as their beauty is identical. Neele’s newest campaign goes to TShirterie and goes the natural path — nothing show-off or tacky about it, just a tiny girly twist delicately injected in the mood (as much in the outfit as in her impish expression). Spring is a bit slow to blossom up this year but this bunch of visuals of the last few days has enough spark to replace the sun for a while.

Between two posts dedicated to the highest spheres of fashion (where every single inch of an image is carefully handled), it sometimes appears completely relieving to turn to other areas of the modeling planet — sweetly girly commercial materials such as Inka Hoeper’s latest job for the italian brand Phard. As much as I’m sometimes tired of high fashion editorials focusing too much on garments (especially when an expression on the main character’s face or magical body language can do much more for the visual), I’m sometimes tempted to go the oposite route when it comes to less arty stuff. Like on the two happily shiny photographs above. And the naked truth is Inka perfectly finds her way in this glossy, colorful imagery and surreal atmosphere.