Is 14 too young to walk in a fashion show?
Filed under: Runway Trends, Celebrities with Style
It's Fashion Week in Australia (AFW) and there is a scandale brewing down under about underage models.
Billed as the next big thing, 14 year old Polish model, Monika Jagaciak, aka Jak, is walking in her first show at AFW. Like all school age models, Jak was required to get a note from her parents and her school principal that said she was allowed to miss school.
Even with this explicit permission, people are still up in arms that this type of "career" exploits and overly sexualizes very young girls.
Well, duh.
We have to admit, Jak is stunning. She has already been photographed by Stephen Meisel in a white bathing suit, being sprayed by a shower jet. By the way...she was only 13 when that picture was shot.
It seems pretty overly sexual to us. Also exploitive. Also, proof that only a 14 year old looks good in a white bathing suit, but that's a different post.
On the other hand, Vogue refused to include her in their coverage of AFW. Vogue Australia editor Kirsty Clements also called for a minimum age of 16 for models.
We have to wonder how Jak is handling the attention and the temptations that most certainly accompany it.
When we were 14, we went on a band trip from Boston to NYC. There, away from preventative maternal eyes, we committed a dreadful hair bleaching mistake in an airport hotel. It was very Nick Rhodes, and even for the 80s it was hideous.
Jak most certainly has access to bigger and badder mistakes than we ever did. Will she look back on this time in her life as the start of a stellar career? Or the first step on the road to ruin?
Only time, and possibly Karl Lagerfeld (because Uncle Karl knows everything,) can tell.
Christina Warren 4-11-2008 @ 1:09PM
That's pretty hypocritical of Vogue (granted, this was US Vogue), considering Brooke Shields was 14 when they put her on the cover. I mean, I realize that was nearly 30 years ago (yeesh), but the argument seems kind of bizarre. Paris is already all over this girls so I really don't think Aussie's prudishness is going to have an impact one way or another -- other than to give the girl more buzz.
Is she incredibly young -- yes. Are the pictures provocative, yes, but I wouldn't call them overtly sexualized. If she were an actress, she could play a highly sexualized role and there might be some controversy, but it would be accepted (by most) that it is part of art. How is photography or walking a runway any different?
But my opinion doesn't matter -- if Polish law says she can model and her parents or guardian are willing to sign-off and be present, she's going to continue to model. And the girl is stunning -- absolutely stunning -- one of the best new faces in YEARS. It's not like the runway isn't already littered with 15 and 16 year old models. Let her walk!
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cat lincoln 4-11-2008 @ 2:59PM
Yeah, the genie is out of the bottle with this girl. And yes, she is so beautiful that she will probably on every cover of every magazine before too long.
The thing is, in some pictures you can just catch an unguarded childishness. I think that's the troubling part - she is just a child and she is being used to sell something that ideally she would remain unfamiliar with for at least a couple of years.
She'll probably be beautiful her whole life. I just think it's too bad she's rushing into it so early.