Friday, January 1, 2016

Who owns your image?


Another year, another image. I think that may be the ishotkatemoss motto for 2016. We have done a reasonable job of avoiding the person “Kate Moss” as opposed to focusing on images of an idea of kate moss.

But, as we begin the new year, an interesting controversy regarding Kate herself, her ‘rocker’ husband (Jamie Hince) from whom she has separated, family, memory, ideas, love (or lack thereof), image making, modeling, photography and expression has surfaced.

From The Sun today:
Kate Moss’s fury at ex Jamie Hince’s plan to publish a series of photographs of her The model wants to ban the release of the snaps taken over the course of ‘doomed relationship’
“KATE MOSS and JAMIE HINCE are at war over private snaps of the supermodel.
… the rocker was looking to publish a series of arty pictures taken in the course of their doomed relationship, with a potentially lucrative coffee-table book deal in the offing.
But Kate is desperate for Jamie not to profit from her image and is trying to stop the release of the pictures, claiming she has ownership of them.
A source said: “Jamie took thousands of photos of Kate during their time together, he considered it a hobby. He pretty much documented their entire time together and has film, digital and print images as part of his collection.
“Jamie also has a handwritten diary and scrap books featuring stuff they did together. But Kate wants these to remain private and is furious with Jamie for even considering publishing them for his own profit.
“The pics essentially show Kate really letting her hair down and living life to excess.
“You can understand why there is such a demand for them.”
Jamie held an exhibition featuring photos of Kate in New York in 2014, and a topless snap of the supermodel made it onto the invite … (The Sun) learned Kate was unhappy with the revealing picture being used and it was one of the reasons she didn’t attend the event.
Jamie, currently based in New York, had been seeing Victoria’s Secret model JESSICA STAM but the relationship ended last month. No doubt he racked up a reasonable collection of snaps from that romance, too.”

Hince, when asked about Kate in the context of his exhibition and including so many images of the supermodel stated: "My wife's very photogenic. So I love taking pictures of her."
Some of Hince's image's of Moss

Yes, but does Hince own her image? And, what does she think of being constantly photographed by her partner? Before hazarding a guess, we can go back in time and look for a pattern here … 

A few years a go, Kate revealed what it was like to shoot her iconic Calvin Klein Obsession campaign with her boyfriend at the time, photographer Mario Sorrenti. Klein booked Sorrenti to shoot the campaign after looking at Sorrenti's book, which was full of shots of Moss.
"Calvin was clever, he saw from the pictures that it was obsession, and it really was an obsession," she said. Sorrenti and a 17-year-old Moss ended up spending over a week shooting photos at a deserted little shack on the beach. Moss said:
“I'd wake up in the morning and he'd be taking pictures of me. I was like, 'Fuck off!' I lay like that [naked on a couch] for 10 days. He would not stop taking pictures of that. But, he's Italian, you know? He was like, 'Lay down, I'll tell you when we've got it!' We probably had it in the first roll.”
The couple broke up after the photoshoot. "… we split up after that," Moss said. "When you're in a relationship with a photographer and they start abusing that relationship - and being like, 'I want you to do this, and I want you to do that' - it makes you go, 'No'. I didn't want to work all the time, but he'd be like, 'Get up on the roof, take your clothes off,' and I would think, 'Fuck off!' Now I understand that kind of thing a bit better, capturing an image, but at the time I was 17."

So, when does a photographer stop shooting? Or maybe the question is, when does a model stop modeling?
When does someone famous stop being a celebrity? When does the image of Kate Moss stop being an idea of a brand? It appears, never. Not even when she sleeps. The threat of an image is ever present.
Hince photographing Moss
Maybe she should get into a relationship with ishotkatemoss, as we, for one, are not interested in creating more images of her. We are only interested, given that her image is ever present,  in reinterpreting  previously created images of the idea of kate.

Guess we will continue this path in 2016 as her image continues to linger.

Observe. Slow Down. Shoot. Submit

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