muse
[myooz]
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a goddess that inspires a creative artist
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I’m always looking for a remarkable person to inspire my photography. A muse, if you will.
This is not a romantic or sexual pursuit, but rather, an ongoing quest to find a creative soulmate who feels a deep satisfaction in collaborating on concepts and creating art for the sake of creation. Someone who shares a passion for fashion and beautiful things. Someone who enjoys putting together photo shoots as much as I do.
In Greek mythology, there were nine sister goddesses, each of whom was regarded as the protectress of a different art or science. In today’s world, a muse is simply a person regarded as inspiring a poet, artist, thinker, or the like. Sometimes the muse is a wife or girlfriend. Sometimes she is just a beautiful woman whose charisma delights and inspires everyone she meets.
My friend Candace Rae is like that. Her looks are obvious, but it is personality that’s infectious. I hired her after meeting her on Savvy.com, where I was the editor. She was just this cool chick that everyone instantly loved. She was more cute than anything, but I saw potential in her and flew her to Atlanta to do a photo shoot. That led to gigs posing for Men’s Health, UMM, Askmen.com, and Maxim, as well as being featured internationally as a Playboy.com Cyber Girl. This is her below in that first photo shoot back in 2007.
Sadly, I don’t get to talk to Candace as often as I used to because she’s hundreds of miles away in the Great White North. She recently became a mom. That’s the thing about muses — and models you enjoy working with generally — they eventually move on in life and retire from the scene. Hopefully, the friendships endure once the posing stops.
I consider my friend Tara Lynn to be a creative muse because we always get great stuff when we shoot, as we have often. I’ve also frequently collaborated with Paige Turner, although not as often lately. My muses are usually an hour or more down the road. I wish I had a muse living right down the street, available and eager to shoot on little notice, enthusiastic about producing something cool when inspiration strikes. Work and school schedules can really complicate things when people try to connect.
You never know when an amazing muse will enter your life and change everything.
Here are a few examples from the intersection of chance and fate:
Kate Moss was discovered at the age of 14 in 1988, at JFK Airport in New York City, after a holiday in the Bahamas, when Sarah Doukas (the founder of Storm Model management) saw her.
Gisele Bundchen was 14 when she was scouted by Elite Model Agency.
Candice Swanepoel was scouted at a market when she was 15.
Adriana Lima entered the Ford Supermodel of the World contest in Brazil when she was 15, and Alessandra Ambrosio entered the Elite Model Search when she was 15.
Nigel Davies noticed 16-year-old Lesley Hornby in 1966 and offered her a modeling contract. She swept England as the “Face of 66” under the alias Twiggy.
Olga Kurylenko was discovered at age 13 by a scout in a Moscow subway. She continues to have a great modeling career and starred recently as a Bond Girl in the rebooted James Bond movie franchise.
Naomi Campbell, at age 15, was spotted by a former Ford model while window-shopping. She soon became a full-time model, signing with Elite Model Management. She was one of the great supermodels of the 1980s and one of the first African-American supermodels.
Jessica Stam was discovered in an Ontario coffee shop by an agent.
Iselin Steiro was discovered while Christmas shopping with her parents in London. In fact, she was scouted twice on the same trip. The first scout was turned down by her mother, who answered “over my dead body” when asked if Iselin would be interested in modeling. The second scout sent a letter to a local agency, which sought her up. After her father went with her to one of her first jobs, he gave the okay for her to model.
Luke Worrall wanted to be a punk rocker and was training to be an electrician, but an agent stopped him and asked if he was interested in modeling when he was seen coming back from the skate park with his friends.
Lisa Cant was discovered at age 14 at an Ikea store in Calgary by another model.
Sasha Pivovarova, while a student of art at Russian University for the Humanities, signed with IMG after her friend and photographer, Igor Vishnyakov, took photos of her and submitted them to the agency.
Lily Cole was walking through the streets of Soho after a hamburger with friends when a scout-turned actor Benjamin Hart approached her. She ran, fearing she was being chased by “some dodgy guy,” but after being asked to consider modeling, she accepted and was signed on with Storm Models.
Bianca Balti was discovered in a supermarket where she was employed to finance her studies, by Bruno paulette, a scout of Modelschule.
I try to imagine that moment when I am at the mall and I see someone with such a remarkable look that I risk rejection just to suggest we do a photo shoot. It’s quite uncomfortable when you see them roll their eyes, writing you off as just another creep hitting on them or some sort of weirdo. Guilty until proven innocent? Yes!
I guess I need to have a girlfriend willing to make the pitch, but that’d require a lady who understands I’m not using her to proposition unfamiliar girls for anything unsavory. Although I might make someone look sensual in a picture, it isn’t about sex. It is about creativity, the same as Leonardo da Vinci painting the Mona Lisa in 1503. Sometimes I feel like Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network trying to convince Eduardo Saverin that this thing being created has potential beyond grabbing the low hanging fruit.
Most models are discovered around age 14-16.
This is because agencies want to get as much mileage as possible when they invest in marketing a new face. It is easier to book jobs for the same model for several years than to constantly find and train new talent. These days, a girl can enter modeling while she’s in middle school and still be working into her 30s if she’s able to adapt her look to fit a wide age range and has a solid reputation as a reliable talent who isn’t afraid of hard work. She can generate quite a bit of money over that period of time, with her agency seeing a pretty decent return on that initial investment. Plastic surgery, a dedication to fitness and a solid work ethic can mean endurance.
The fact that so many models get their start at age 14-16 presents some challenges for me, as most people are rightfully suspicious of a grown man who approaches teenagers who are not even old enough to drive! I am far more likely to engage the prospective model’s mother and/or father directly to suggest doing an age-appropriate photo shoot if I think I have discovered someone with the look and presence to make it as a model.
Then the aim is to illustrate in the photos that the girl is able to pull off a range of ages, from the schoolgirl to the college aged, so she’s appealing to an agency that will want to book her for as many jobs as possible.
While I would love to be able to say that I discovered the next Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition cover girl while she was eating ice cream in the same shop where I take my daughter, I am personally more likely to be inspired and want to collaborate with grown women who have life experience rather than little girls who have no idea how the world works. I don’t want to send some naive little girl into the lion’s den of the modeling biz. If I work with someone younger who has an interest in becoming a model, I try to educate them about what’s expected and what to look out for.
Yes, modeling is insanely competitive. Pretty girls are a dime a dozen. But a model with a versatile look, a passion for what she’s doing and a willingness to consistently do the work and be reliable is more rare. A microscopic number of models ever become famous and most don’t actually work full-time at it. But then I’ve also seen girls put themselves through college by doing modeling jobs on weekends, even if it’s just dressing sexy at a trade show to call attention to an exhibitor.
The wannabes and never weres can sit down, because people in the industry want to collaborate with the ones who are here to work, arriving on time, mentally prepared with their game face on. They want the ones who take care of their skin, so we don’t have to spend time retouching blotches and blemishes in Photoshop. The ones who eat right, get enough sleep and don’t drag into photo shoots still drunk from partying the night before.
There are a lot of posers out there who want people to THINK they are models when they really aren’t. And that’s fine. I’m willing to take their money and create an excellent model portfolio so they can make their girlfriends envious and impress guys by showing off their “model” shots on their iPhones in some dark nightclub. They want to be perceived as beautiful enough to model, but if you actually book them jobs, they’ll more than likely blow it off to go partying instead. Which makes you look terrible if you are the guy who vouched for them!
Having a great look may be enough to pull together a decent photo shoot, but I don’t attach my name and reputation to anyone who I sense might behave unprofessionally and reflect badly upon me for making the referral to the agency. I also don’t like flakes or quitters. It can cause quite a stir if an agency invests in marketing a model, just to have him or her quit because they’ve lost interest, would rather be playing than working or because a jealous boyfriend or girlfriend asks them to abruptly stop.
I’m amazed by how many girls think modeling is easy, yet when I get them in front of my camera, they act like deers in the headlights. There’s more to it than just standing there looking pretty. You gotta move, be animated, be versatile, illustrate the desired mood or concept with style and personality!
I speak of muses as if they must be female, but sometimes the muse is a guy! Again, it is an aesthetic thing — creative chemistry rather than a sexual chemistry. I tend to photograph way more women than men, but part of the reason is that women are so universally attractive with their curves and cosmetics, plus men in my area are generally less inclined to be models. Yes, I have approached guys here asking if they’d pose for me. They’re usually less worried about looking emasculated once I pair them with a beautiful female.
I work with a lot of first-time models, so I am accustomed to gently instructing them on how to move. But the one I really want to work with is the model who has studied the pictures in fashion magazines and practiced those poses in her bedroom mirror. She makes it quicker and easier to shoot a lot of stuff. My challenge is keeping up with HER rather than stopping to tell her where to put her hands on every single shot we do.
The perfect muse approaches modeling with a serious mind and maturity beyond her years. She appreciates that this is work, although work that can be extremely fun to do and produce something amazing. A great muse shares your sense of humor and appreciates the art of conversation.
My perfect muse is beautiful, of course. The kind of beautiful that has left a thousand broken hearts of infatuated boys in her path. She’s curvaceous, but not necessarily busty. She suggests ideas for how to improve the shot. She knows how to bend her limbs to create interesting lines. She’s well aware of the best angles to turn that body.
My quest to find muses continues. If you know of anyone who might be a good fit to what I’ve described, let me know about them. You never know what might come of it.
My Sweet Oasis 
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