A Model's Significant Other

"If you want total security, go to prison. There you're fed, clothed, given medical care and so on. The only thing lacking... is freedom." 

~ Dwight D. Eisenhower

"The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them." 

~ Ernest Hemingway 

Every now and again, all photographers run into some kind of ordeal with their models. I've been very fortunate to not have had this happen to often. Most times, probably since I have been a model, I get along with my models and we do some great work in a collaborative effort that brings credit to the both of us. Actually, now that I think about it, I'm starting this blog post off in the wrong way. I'm giving you the impression that an episode transpired between myself and a model that I have worked with. Well, YES and NO. Yes, an episode occurred, but NO, it was not by the free will of the model. This actually had to do with a model whom later married and now said husband has issues. Thereby forcing an undesired episode between the aforementioned model and myself. 

Another opportunity with Joanie

I feel it necessary to discuss the matter because for one, it is front and centered on my mind for the last two days or so. I hate drama. I detest it. This is drama that has arisen from a model I worked with more than 3 years ago. While we have spoken often in that time, our communications came to almost a halt when she got married about a year ago and now I fully understand why. Now this girl and I were very tight. We were friends for a good year before I even worked with her. It was just before I came to Vegas when she asked about posing for me before I left. This girl is close enough of a friend that I refuse her nothing. She had special requests and I accommodated. We did a lot of great work, even though I was frustrated in that I had no more pro-grade film. I had just finished school and had used every last roll I had. So I was stuck using consumer-grade along with out-dated slide film that my instructor gave away at the end of the semester. Okay, I digress.

At the heart of the matter is that the new husband is not keen on my friend/his wife having male friends. It matters little that I now live roughly 1800 miles away. Presently, contact has been shut off with the exception of a request to remove all her images from the web. Granted, I have a model release. I could do whatever I wish, but out of respect for her, I chose to acquiesce to her behest. This came about after I kept getting requests earlier this year to see more of this model by an someone using an unknown identity. After a while, I became somewhat anxious about the situation and warned the model as I had reason to believe she might know this person. I took the precautions of scrubbing all my profiles, sites, and blogs of all of her images because I simply didn't know who this creep was.

All was quiet until I decided to resurrect and re-edit some of this model's images. I used only anonymous shots and even asked for permission to display them again. In no time, Creepy-guy was back again. I had had enough. I wasted no time doing search after search with what little info I had and plugged in assumptions for the rest. I finally discovered the possibility that the culprit was either an in-law or her husband. I didn't know for sure in either case and I could have been totally wrong all together. I contacted the model and let her know my suspicions, which I needed for her to confirm or negate. My next contact was going to be friends in the area that could easily put a face to my enigma and dissuade any further harassment. When she discovered it was her own husband trying to "test" my responses, what could I do? His repeated tests to ascertain whether or not I am an honorable man were exhaustive and futile. I never showed him and especially not her any disrespect. He should have gotten a clue when I pulled all my images of her the first time because I thought he was a creep. I never identified her or even used her real name. He was suspicious of me profiting off of her. I've never made a dime! If all that didn't illustrate that I had her best interests at heart, what would have? I've only been a good friend to this girl and now, to alleviate any more difficulties in her marriage, I have to willfully bow out and agree to act as if I ever met her. That's bullshit. The main thing that gets me is the grief from thinking my friend may have been in danger. I don't understand why either of us had to be put through that. So now I volunteered, for her sake, to show him the ultimate show of respect and walk away. His wife-card trumps my friend-card in every hand. I only hope this doesn't get worse for her. She may as well don a burka.

Sam... being a BAD GIRL! I don't treat all my models like this. 
Sam can handle it, though.

I want to thank everyone else, especially Unbearable Lightness and AlexB for helping me not make any rash or hasty decisions. I got several acknowledgements that I was doing the right thing by my model and I appreciate that. Can you tell that this really bothered me? Yeah, she meant a lot to me. I hate to lose her on these terms. It was difficult to even write this. I don't want her to think I am writing this out of anger for her and its not my intent to be disparaging to her husband. At the same time, I didn't initiate any of this and all my efforts and dealings with his wife have been honorable. This is the primary reason I respond the way I do when a model asks, "Is it okay for my husband/boyfriend to come along?" But that opens up the door for personal choices in policies. For me, I never let the significant other accompany us in a shoot. Ain't happening. Okay, its done.

"Dina Vierna, Model and Muse for Art's Masters"

"You must search for happiness in your life. Don't get discouraged. Look ahead with hope."

- Dina Vierny, art model/ art collector/ art dealer/ owner, Musee Maillol

This is my first post for the new year. I'm still not quite used to writing 2009 on everything I have to date just yet. I don't think I'm going to start blogging about everything I plan on doing this year or how I hope to achieve some specific goal. You'll forget about it after you close out of your browser and so will I before the month is out. Instead I'll just dive right in instead of talking about it.

One interesting thing I'll note is that Chris St. James reposted one of my blog entries...The Mature Woman. He seemed to like the points I made and added to them. In addition to the model Susan, who posed for this project, he also made mention of Unbearable Lightness who is also a model of maturity. Check out UL's blog post. I think she and Chris called it a woman in full bloom. Well I can tell you there ain't nobody on the planet blooming like Unbearable Lightness. She's so hot ... well, never mind. I digress. My point is that its really cool and gratifying to an artist when he or she is recognized for their work. I'm a photographer and I try to produce images that people appreciate. However its also gratifying to be recognized for what I write. It sort of validates one's work to be recognized so. All vanity aside, don't you think this is what every artist seeks? To share one's work and have one's efforts recognized and appreciated? Granted, there are some who create simply for themselves as an outlet or means of expression who have no desire to show anybody. There are exceptions to every rule. But is it not true that recognition is the greatest desire for an artist?

On a totally different matter, I've been tracking the work of Alex, another beautiful model in full bloom, on deviantArt. I've talked about her before on here and since then, I've made it a point to keep tabs on her work. A very unfortunate event has unfolded between her and another photographer over photo rights. I don't know the whole story on the matter, but the results were that she had to take down every photo that he took of her from her profile, which were quite a few and very good, I might add. All this took place over a misunderstanding which were not ironed out in a model release. Instead of being embarrassed about the event or demeaning of the photographer, I admire the way Alex chooses to take the high road on the matter. She treats it as a learning experience and then chooses to share this with everyone who will heed her words. Isn't that extraordinary? I can tell you that I make it a rule that I don't release the shutter with a model in my viewfinder unless I have a signed model release in my possession. There have been about 3 times that I've not abided by that rule and there have been 3 times when not having a release came back to bite me in the ass. Coincidence...? I think maybe so. Make sure everything is spelled out. I am also more than positive that, because Alex chose to take the high road on this issue, deviantArt has seen the light and she's in the clear with them.

And finally, I finish with another model who has now matured. A week or so ago, The Morning Edition on NPR did an segment on Dina Vierny entitled, "Dina Vierny, Model And Muse For Art's Masters" by Susan Stamberg. Dina Vierny is most noted for being an art model for sculptor, Aristide Maillol and painter, Henri Matisse. She started as an art model for Maillol, who was 73 at the time, when she was 15 years old. The article goes on to tell the story of how Vierny became the inspiration for Maillol's for the next 10 years. Later, when she is arrested for helping other artists and intellectuals escape France during the German occupation, it was Maillol who hired a lawyer and got her released. He then helped send her away to live with his friend Matisse to keep her from any further trouble. Well, now Vierny has opened a museum with Maillol's work. As it turns out, this art model had become an art dealer after being so encouraged by Matisse. In 1996, she opened and now runs Musee Maillol. You have to admit...this is a great story. I found it to be inspirational and was grateful for the lesson in history. I used the last line in her article as my above quote for the day.You can also check out another article in the NY Times on her entitled, "A Sculptor's Obsession, A Model's Devotion", written by Vicki Goldberg.

I thought I'd put up a few more images from my work with Erica. Sweet, huh? Enjoy.

The Newest Muse

“I never refused when he wanted to take a picture,” said Eleanor Callahan, the 91-year-old widow of the photographer Harry Callahan. “I never complained, whatever I was doing. If he said: ‘Come quick, Eleanor — there’s a good light,’ I was right there." - New York Times "The Artist's Wife: A Constant Muse Who Never Said No"

Chris St. James has been gracious enough to feature me on his Universe d'Artistes blog a number of times now. However his latest post on me is a recreation of an interview we did a year ago. He's added to it using some of my own posts as well as dialog/commentary I've made on his own blog. Its truely remarkable to witness this man's imagination and I felt very honored to be worthy of his time, energy, and creativeness that produced his 21 November 08 posting of our interview. In fact, go ahead and click over to it now. I'll wait.....

Welcome back! So what did you think? The man's a genius, is he not?

In other news, I'm still working on wrapping up this year's final projects. I've got just a few more to go, but lots of edits. I was hoping to take advantage of the holiday season with some more freelance work, but I'm not sure if its going to work out as I may have liked. Four or five good projects would have been nice. So now I have goals for next year. For the time being, I stick with my endeavors to shoot more subjects other than nudes, retool my business persona, and manage my workflow and activities better. At the same time, I've desired to try to take some time to relax a bit. You know... SLEEP! I think it was last week or the week before whereby I was averaging 3 hours of sleep a day and for the longest, I hadn't even slept in my own bed. Much of my rest time came with my head down on my keyboard or my neck cracked over sideways as I slouched over in my computer chair. Crazy, I know. Well, I'm trying to make a concerted effort to do much better at prioritizing sleep IN a bed, for more than 5 hours at a time. If I can get at least 5 hours in the bed a day, that'll be sweet and I have been doing better at it. There have even been 2 days this past week where I slept 9 hours...straight!

The images you see here are of my latest muse. I've worked with Lessa, Lissa, and now Melissa. She was referred to me by Faerie and even though it took a while to actually meet, I am so glad we did. I shot her last week sometime and the experience was marvelous. I made reference to her in the last posting about being a homie from Texas. She's the one who we share the experience of both having our first jobs being at Braum's Ice Cream. Grandy's is another place we discussed missing so much. They've got some of the best fried chicken for when momma ain't making it at the time. I tell you this girl is full of energy and imagination. I am sooo glad I got to finally meet her. It was one of those things were we just hit it off right as I stepped into the door. We didn't get to go through all my normal interviews and such. In most cases, I have to insist on at least some of my basic protocols. In this case, we had a mutual trusted friend, so I knew she was cool and she also works as an art model, thereby I know she's already comfortable with being nude. Basically everything else I needed to know we covered via email and we just made it happen. The woman is a great in conversation and so darned intuitive. We'll be doing this again.

I hope everyone has a Happy Thanksgiving. Please take it easy, relax with family and friends, and make this a safe holiday. Also enjoy these featured artist links. Both of these are models I have been in dialogs with from deviantArt. The first is ModelDonna. There are some models who simply have that "it", and Donna is definitely one of them. I made a comment that she's someone I could probably photography exclusively. I think I could make a career off this girl alone. And then there is AlexB244. I've just started a series of work on the mature woman. Alex has that grace and beauty that is evidence the art model can go on beyond the limits of time. The supermodel has a shelf life of 5 to 7 years. Not many are able to make it beyond 10. The art model is different. She can go on as long as she desires. I wish it were a truism that the art model is the ideal woman by whom young girls measured themselves against. And when you look at Alex, you know for sure that your real beauty is to the core. Photoshop is only a layer deep.