I think most clothing companies advertise their clothes by showing people with no clothes. They aren't selling the clothes anymore, they are selling the image, and for some reason, it works, though I am uncertain why......who the hell would want to be cool like the naked anorexic people?
I find it really frustrating in this case because AA seems to play up its "progressive" image & highlights its unique production policies (selling the image, as you said), & then this is what they come up with for marketing the finished product. it's like dre said below, the kind of twisted ethics that apply to certain workers whom we can accept as "marginalized" (ie factory workers) but not to others (clerks/models, whatever they are). I feel like the ethics that are being used to push AA products on a certain target market are somewhat hollow if they only extend selectively to the company's own employees.
It's true that the retail employees don't make quite as much money as the factory workers for American Apparel. I don't think it's unfair though; the factory jobs require more skill and effort. As for the models, they get 50 USD for each hour of shooting, whether their pictures end up being used or not. I guess that's much less than what models make usually. But I don't see what is unethical about it. No one is photographed against their will.
dov charney is a perv, did you read that article where he wanked off in front of a jane magazine interviewer? it is disturbing when you go in the store and see all those photos of girl with the asses in the air, but i guess he is just unapologetically pervy. he takles most of the photos, i've read.
I'd never even heard this guy's name before, but I'm definitely going to check him out now, & see if I can find that article. (esp considering the comment below!) thanks for the info :)
i have never bought anything directly from them. i find their "fuck our upper-middle-class white girl store clerks, they're sluts but we're ETHICAL see no SWEATSHOPS" attitude to be insulting, not to mention representative of the general sort of activism i think is all too prevalent, which is helping the person you can't see while ignoring the problems under your nose. not that sweatshops are good. i've been tempted, but the only things of theirs i've bought are the ones that are from other stores and things are printed on them.
ya, most of the stuff I have from them is actually through other companies that use their clothes for screenprinting & whatnot. which they're great for. I agree with you but I don't really know what to do about it.
I started as Dov's assistant, so I know him personally. Not biblically though, so I can't pronounce on whether he is or is not a perv. He's definitely a good (if somewhat eccentric) person. Sometimes too trusting. The woman who wrote for Jane was not the most ethical journalist, IMHO. She developed a very very personal relationship with her subject and then exploited that. But whatever. Jaime Wolf's NYT Magazine article that came out last week is much more insightful.
As for the pictures... Your post is very funny. But seriously, they are not posed. They actually are what they look to be: people hanging out in their apartments (cars? I don't think so). The models are co-workers, friends, lovers. Not just of Dov; other people take pictures too, most of them girls actually.
To aj, c'mon be fair. American Apparel models are far from anorexic! They are actual un-retouched people.
I'm glad you commented, it's nice when I'm not allowed to be completely one-sided ;)
I'm confused though about the images not being "posed" .. how do you avoid being posed if you're doing a photo shoot for clothing advertisments? I appreciate that the models are pretty much as "real" as it gets, but even so, they're quite homogenous in terms of their looks (with their variations in colour, ethnicity, nationality etc carefully noted in many of their little intros). & these are the pics I was referring to with the car remark:
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The surroundings are not posed. The photos are taken in locations where the photographers or the models live or work. It's not a studio set up to look like a bedroom in which a model pretends to be relaxing while a team of people touches up her hair, make-up, and fixes lighting set-up. I think it's usually just two people (model and photographer), and no one pretends to be more comfortable than they really are. That's what I meant
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anyhow, i like their clothes a lot, too.
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dov charney disgusts me, though. utter disgust.
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I started as Dov's assistant, so I know him personally. Not biblically though, so I can't pronounce on whether he is or is not a perv. He's definitely a good (if somewhat eccentric) person. Sometimes too trusting. The woman who wrote for Jane was not the most ethical journalist, IMHO. She developed a very very personal relationship with her subject and then exploited that. But whatever. Jaime Wolf's NYT Magazine article that came out last week is much more insightful.
As for the pictures... Your post is very funny. But seriously, they are not posed. They actually are what they look to be: people hanging out in their apartments (cars? I don't think so). The models are co-workers, friends, lovers. Not just of Dov; other people take pictures too, most of them girls actually.
To aj, c'mon be fair. American Apparel models are far from anorexic! They are actual un-retouched people.
Anyway, I am glad you still like the clothes!
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I'm confused though about the images not being "posed" .. how do you avoid being posed if you're doing a photo shoot for clothing advertisments? I appreciate that the models are pretty much as "real" as it gets, but even so, they're quite homogenous in terms of their looks (with their variations in colour, ethnicity, nationality etc carefully noted in many of their little intros). & these are the pics I was referring to with the car remark:
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