An example of Miles Aldridge’s work
Photographer and model relationships are not new.
There are those that have married: Lisa Fonssagrives and Irving Penn, Sasha Pivovarova and Igor Vishnyakov, Kristen McMenamy and Miles Aldridge. Not to mention the current relationships between Caroline Trentini and Victor Demarchelier, and Julia Stegner and Steven Pan.
But did you know that Miles Aldridge bases the start of his career off of an ex-girlfriend and Kate Moss? The iconic photographer, who has shot for legendary magazines such as Vogue Italia and Numéro, was an illustration student at Central Saint Martins and the rest is fashion history.
“In London around ‘95, I was dating this girl who was really beautiful, but not beautiful in a particularly model-y way—at least as that was understood at the time. Basically she was too short. But then Kate Moss came along, and my girlfriend decided she could be a model after all, so she asked me to take some photos of her, which I did. When she showed her book to British Vogue, they asked to see me. Her career never really got off the ground, but that’s how mine started. It was a good time—between Kate and the whole grunge thing, if you were English and could hold a camera, people in New York would meet with you. And my sister, who was a model, let me know that in her experience all photographers were idiots, so therefore I was qualified.”
And as if the Met’s Costume Institute Gala’s “The Model as Muse” paired with the International Center of Photography’s exhibit of Richard Avedon’s work was just not enough supermodel (when is it ever too much, really?), then you’re in luck. From May 28 - June 20, Miles will afford the U.S. his very first solo showing at the Steven Kasher Gallery. His vision will grace the windows of Henri Bendel, as the models will reinterpret his images. One more addition to the Return of the Supermodel obsession.
