Part of me wishes

[imomus]

You'd think it would be easy to find cute girls in fashion magazines, but they never seem to feature the nerdy dark-haired, dark-eyed types I like. Page after page, fashion mags present a disconcertingly Aryan conception of beauty. So I play safe with Japanese idols like Yu Aoi, who have the kind of oriental-giaconda sloe-eyed serenity I like.

One of my favourite streetwear / style mags these days is Dutch mag Code. I like their visual style, and I like their taste in girls. It was in Code that I first saw photos of Emmy the Great, seen here in a slick new video in collaboration with British band Brighton Port Authority:

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The new edition of Code alerts me to a slightly different kind of beauty, equally appealing: they have some lovely pictures of Sofia Boutella, a 26 year-old Algerian dancer.

I come pretty late to Sofia -- she has the fingerprints of Nike and Madonna and Jamiroquai on her already. Here she is in a Nike documentary:

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That reminds me that when I recommended the cuteness of Lou Doillon she was already a figurehead for Lee Cooper. Then again, I'm not always late, and I don't always take my cue from the commercial juggernaut of spectacular mass culture; I've discovered a few beauties myself -- quiet, shy, dark-eyed beauties, some who enlisted me to promote them, others who forbade even to be mentioned. I could start a modeling agency with the Turkish girls I see daily on the U8 line here in Berlin.

Watch this Tateshots video in which Juergen Teller talks about, and shows, the models turning up on his doorstep and I defy you (if you're male and hetero, or lesbian for that matter, or bi) not to entertain a passing fantasy about the exact limits you'd place on your power over these girls. Part of me really wishes I'd been a fashion photographer -- do I really need to spell out which part?

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Why should it be "disconcerting" that magazines largely written by "Aryans", for a largely "Aryan" readership, have an "Aryan" conception of beauty? And why do you use a loaded term like Aryan, instead of Caucasion, or white, or whatever? Momus: the self-hating Aryan!

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Because very few of us Caucasians live in monoracial societies. Magazines from Holland -- since we're talking about Code -- would basically be aligning themselves with the far right if they failed to represent Dutch racial diversity within their pages. And I'd call that disconcerting, wouldn't you?

[(Anonymous)]

The Netherlands is one of the most racially diverse countries in Western Europe, and yet it is still overwhelmingly populated by white, ethnically Dutch people - 81 percent, according to Wikipedia. Would a Dutch magazine that is 81 percent aligned to "Aryan" conceptions of beauty satisfy you? But seriously, this notion that cultural product must somehow reflect the population is absurd, and one you've argued against yourself, in other contexts.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

I think as a matter of political priority magazines and advertisers should (and do) think about what the ethnicity of their models says about their political stance on the question of diversity and immigration. They don't need to represent ethnic diversity in fixed proportions, but if it's there they should represent it, otherwise they're clearly proposing the indigenous type as a paradigm.

But even if I didn't believe that, I'd want to see black-haired girls and brown-eyed girls just to see my own personal preferences reflected. I want my own typology complemented, not complimented.

Speaking of Juergen Teller, the current issue of Tank has some great photos by him of African model Kinée Diouf (http://www.bryanboy.com/bryanboy_le_superstar_fab/2008/10/kine-for-tank-magazine---volume-5-issue-5.html).

And I'd also like to add that Japan is an interesting contrast: Japan actually shows more ethnic diversity in its fashion magazines than it does on its streets. But this "diversity" actually turns out to be a mixture of ethnic Japanese and "Aryan" Western models. I would like to see fewer of these Western models in Japanese fashion mags, and if you accuse me of "asymmetrical multiculturalism" as a result, so be it. Asymmetrical multiculturalism is inevitable in a world where one local racial type (the "Aryan") is taken to be internationally paradigmatic. The asymmetry is required to offset this presumption.

[(Anonymous)]

Well this is classic Momus-ism! All you want really is to see models in magazines that you, personally, are sexually attracted to, but then you have to tack on some silly argument, to turn a mere preference into some sort of moral imperative. Weren't you a little while ago arguing (vis-a-vis skinny models) that fashion isn't democratic, that it's silly to expect it to be representative? But now you want it to be representative, as long as "representative" means "girls Momus likes".

[imomus.livejournal.com]

It's classic Momus-ism in that it relates the aesthetic (my taste for women of other ethnicities) to the ethical (the need for these ethnicities to be visible for political reasons), and the personal to the political.

The relationship between representation and the paradigmatic is a very complicated one, and it hinges on the question of which particularities get to represent the universal, and how we deal with the injustice inevitably built into that.

[(Anonymous)]

I find relating personal aesthetic tastes to wider ethical imperatives rather doubtful. What would you argue if you actually found Aryan blonde girls attractive? Would you then toss aside your spiel about magazines being ethnically diverse?

1. Momus finds oriental women attractive = "Aryan" magazines should be more ethnically representative.
2. Momus finds skinny girls attractive = it's patently absurd for magazines to be more representative wrt female body sizes.

The ethics bone is connected to the c*ck bone.

[(Anonymous)]

More old and overweight models?! That might be too fair.

We might as well accept that even our morals go through a kind of Desire Filter, which helps to prioritise them, but also compromises them.

The c*ck bone is connected to a*se bone.

[(Anonymous)]

What about demanding 50/50 male/female models? It does strike me that women's magazines are dominated by women (yet womankind are never slammed as 'closet lesbians') and men's magazines are .. also full of women (yet men are repressed homosexuals thanks to buying one magazine, Men's Health, which has pictures of stomachs).

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Well, like I say above, it isn't just about representation, it's about the complicated relationship of the representative with the paradigmatic and the particular with the universal. There's always going to be injustice in who gets to represent universals, who gets to be the role model in the spotlight. But that doesn't stop us rooting for our personal preferences and hoping that they'll get the job.

[electricwitch.livejournal.com]

Because he's completely crazysauce, and also because he apparently thinks being blonde and blue-eyed is bad and I should feel bad for being it.

[(Anonymous)]

i liked the post, in spite of the macho final remark. i love ALL the women. i want ALL the women. ALL WOMEN IN THE WORLD: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQVCDCBDYuI

It's no game(Part 1)

[robinsonner.livejournal.com]

OK you tease, I took up your challenge.
I like it more when you are less obviously sexual.
As someone who sees himself as asexual I would.
Asexuality is a kind of come-on. Think of the Peter Cook song in the movie Bedazzled. The sizzling indifference.

Watching the Teller clip I think of contracts and arrangements which initiate situations. He is turning this over. The frames he uses like the doorway remind me of a rare Bowie pic where he is caught on security cam arriving at John Lennon's house. It's in May Pang's book.

You have set the frame as fantasy yet that often originates in the mind (spurred on by the body, spurred on by the mind...) where eventually an intellectual subtext appears to make the arrangement less seedy (and more seductive?). A moral condom almost. A sexual filter/philtre.

Re: It's no game(Part 1)

[lord-whimsy.livejournal.com]

Wouldn't mind some moral Spanish fly, actually.

[electricwitch.livejournal.com]

You'd think it would be easy to find Momuses in fashion magazines, but they never seem to feature the nerdy, bewigged, one-eyed types I like. Page after page, fashion mags present a disconcertingly Japanese conception of beauty. So I play safe with Aryan idols like David Sylvian, who have the kind of bleached, artificial, powdered serenity I like.

One of my favourite streetwear / style mags these days is Dutch mag Code. I like their visual style, and I like their taste in Momuses. It was in Code that I first saw photos of Lord Whimsy, seen here in a slick new video in collaboration with British band Brighton Port Authority:

The new edition of Code alerts me to a slightly different kind of beauty, equally appealing: they have some lovely pictures of Renato, a 58 year-old Italian dancer.

I come pretty late to Renato -- he has the fingerprints of Berlusconi and Amanda Lear and Crace Jones on him already. Here he is in a RAI UNO documentary:

That reminds me that when I recommended the cuteness of Lou Reed she was already a figurehead for Andy Warhol. Then again, I'm not always late, and I don't always take my cue from the commercial juggernaut of spectacular mass culture; I've discovered a few beauties myself -- quiet, shy, one-eyed beauties, some who enlisted me to promote them, others who forbade even to be mentioned. I could start a record company with the Scottish Momuses I see daily on the Loosduinen line here in The Hague.

Watch this Tateshots video in which Juergen Teller talks about, and shows, the musicians turning up on his doorstep and I defy you (if you're male and hetero, or lesbian for that matter, or bi) not to entertain a passing fantasy about the exact limits you'd place on your power over these Momuses. Part of me really wishes I'd been a fashion photographer -- do I really need to spell out which part?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

If you complain one more time you'll meet an army of me!

[electricwitch.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry you can't tell the difference between complaining and findreplace art :(

But I'm willing to give you a sample of my actual complaining should you want it! It's really Aryan.

off topic!

[(Anonymous)]

momus check the comments:
http://www.africancrisis.co.za/Article.php?ID=37558&

"By 2100, whites will be 25% of the population"?

[(Anonymous)]

If "black parent + white parent = black child", by the common definition, then I'm surprised that academic point doesn't make itself sooner. Why would it be different? The Aryan did well out of colonialism. Colonialism, having a finite scope, gave way to the multi-ethnic. Why marry the genetic equivalent of your sister?