"IS IT JUST ME OR IS THE WORLD FULL OF BEAUTIFUL WOMEN?" (Robbie Coltrane)

SOFYA TITOVA @ next paris new faces division
FASHION CASTING
WE SHOT IN THE AFTERNOON SHE KEPT THE HAIR FROM A MORNING
SHOOT FOR HARPER’S
top & skirt Prada

During a fashion casting you have to stand out at first glance. You are just one of many beauties - a true challenge for your ego, no matter how talented or famous you already are. 

But not just for the main role. One travels along a rocky road until they find the perfect face, picture, and mood for the imaginary story which is going to be told. Trough the following photo series our beloved stylist Ann-Kathrin Obermeyer and photoraph Adrian Crispin captured a (not-so-)random casting situation for our EGO ISSUE. Additionally he mentioned just a fraction of what is admirable in the women's nature. 

See the whole story after the jump.

"How deep should the artist penetrate the work with their identity — How important is the artist?"A conversation with Ayse Erkmen

Ayse Erkmen is a conceptual artist who represented Turkey at the 54th Venice Biennale International Art Exhibition. The public projects of Ayse Erkmen reflect her concerns with the physical, cultural, and social landscapes in which she works. She lives in Istanbul and Berlin, and has been teaching at Münster Kunstakademie since 2010.

Bilgen Coskun talked with Ayse Erkem about the ego in the artist and the art, sociological influences, creative connections and her personal working processes between Istanbul and Berlin. 

HAVE YOU SEEN MY BABY? (Rolling Stones)

shoes prada, stockings wolford
curtain kva

After showing how to hide, it's now about time to stand out from the crowd.

 But let's take baby steps;
 We provide you with a few advices to strengthen your position in the digital world
 and 
today's ruling society,
 accompanied by some beauty products and accessoires which will do the rest. 

The whole story after the jump. 

"IT'S AN ODD THING, BUT ANYONE WHO DISAPPEARS IS SAID TO BE IN SAN FRANCISCO. IT MUST BE A DELIGHTFUL CITY AND POSESSES ALL THE ATTRACTIONS OF THE NEXT WORLD” (Oscar Wilde)

turtleneck Filippa K.,black dress Etro, silk scarf Hermès

Exept the childhood memories of playing hide and seek - 
Who hasn't at some point wished for hiding out for a while?

Due to some favorite fashion accessories, 
the Berlin-based photographer Sabrina Theissen 
and some useful advices we found online
we pointed out some possibilties in our EGO ISSUE. 

See the whole story after the jump. 

HIDE UNTIL EVERYBODY GOES HOME. HIDE UNTIL EVERYBODY FORGETS ABOUT YOU. HIDE UNTIL EVERYBODY DIES.” (Yoko Ono, Grapefruit: A Book of Instructions and Drawings)

Vanity is one of the seven deadly sins. 

No one has embodied vanity to such an extent as the legendary German actress Marlene Dietrich, who secluded herself in her Parisian apartment for the last 11 years of her life. The French photographer Audrey Corregan, acclaimed for her ability to add the right dose of complexity to a simple photograph, resurrected the character of diva Dietrich for the EGO ISSUE through her camera.

Find the complete photo series after the jump. 

WHAT WOULD YOU ATTEMPT TO DO IF YOU KNEW YOU COULD NOT FAIL? A conversation with Katja Dahte

Katja Dathe is a genuine Berliner and started her commitment to creativity while studying pattern construction and tailoring in the GDR. After the fall of the Berlin Wall she was referred to as the genius fashion designer from East Berlin. She distributed her label “Karl Faktor” until 1999 and then ended her career in the fashion scene. Thereafter, Katja played an integral role as a production coordinator in my office (that’s how we became best friends) and in 2006 she became the CEO of Parkhaus, a homeware design company. She decided to join the Berlinbased Pirate Party when she began her studies of economic science.The first Pirate Party was founded on January 1st in 2006 in Sweden. The party’s name was derived from Piratbyrån, an organization opposed to intellectual property. Members of Piratbyrån had previously founded the BitTorrent tracker The Pirate Bay. The Pirate Party supports civil rights, direct democracy and participation, reform of copyright and patent law, free sharing of knowledge (open content), data privacy, transparency, freedom of information, free education, universal healthcare, and a clear separation between church and state. In the election for the House of Representatives of Berlin in 2011 the Pirate Party reached 8.9 percent and moved into the state parliament. Even friends in the United States have recently asked me, “What is going on over there in Berlin?” So it’s about time to spread the word for you my friends. I met with Katja to talk about the party’s values and intentions: about equal rights, supporting individual inhabitants of our city, minimum wage, and of course, about Katja herself. Who can be called a lot of things, but not insane.

A conversation about different kinds of democracy, particular social structures and the meaning of the human ego from the point of view of the pirate party.

"I WON'T BE A ROCKSTAR, I WILL BE A LEGEND."(Freddie Mercury) IN A CONVERSATION WITH THE ECHO VAMPER

Iza Mortag Freund and James Brook came to know and love each other basically because of an essential piece of missing furniture. The Danish dynamite and the classically cool Brit burst onto the punk scene in Aahrus, Denmark by creating the music they wished they were hearing. Their tools are simple — Iza’s remarkable rock ‘n’ roll voice and James’s instinct for instruments. With over-the-top theatrical outfits, including a collection of over 100 hats, their stage presence is electrifying. Their punchy sound is born out of irresistibly raucous vocals, dance inducing guitar riffs, and pulsing drum-machine beats. The Echo Vamper isn’t music for the timid.

A conversation about their churning childhood, the ego on the stage and rockstar attitude. 

I LOVE YOU PROUDLY PRESENTS:THE ECHO VAMPER - "LOVER"

Those, who have been browsing trough THE EGO ISSUE couldn't overlook them.

Those, who attended out launch party this summer couldn't fail to hear them.

If you looked around just a little bit, you might have realized that 

THE ECHO VAMPER,

consisting of Danish dynamite Iza Mortag Freund, our cover model,
and the cool Brit James Brook

 are taking large steps in the direcion of getting

THE NEXT BIG THING.

Ever since we've listened to the edgy, rock'n'roll-tunes of their (first) song "LOVER"for the first time,

the young couple simply got us. 

So we decided to take them in front of our camera and let them do what they are best in: 

Freaking out, performing like noone else in their incomparably look and 

having simply an awesome time.

Enough said-

Ladies and G's, put on your dancing shoes: 

I LOVE YOU PROUDLY PRESENTS:
 "LOVER"

"MODESTY CAN BE BOTH APPEALING AND OFF-PUTTING." In a conversation with Rina Ota

Born on January 11, 1988 in Chiba, Japan, Rina Ota has walked innumerable domestic and international collections since her debut as a model in 2001. She rose to prominence as the face of the international AW 2006/07 Miu Miu campaign. The child of a Japanese father and Russian mother, Ota is proficient in English and Russian. She started her acting career in the movie 69 at the age of 15, and has since appeared in TV dramas, commercials, and on film.


For the EGO ISSUE we talked with Rina about her background, the global differences in the fashion world and the role of the ego  in eastern society. 

"DO ONE THING EVERYDAY THAT SCARES YOU." (Eleanor Roosevelt)

The human mind is an incalculably complex issue. No wonder that it battles with disorders from time to time. Accompanied by a photo series from Jenny & Lee we give you a little introduction to the most distributed ones. But watch out - if you have a tendency to self-diagnoses you should better avoid pressing the "read more"-button.

schizoid

People with schizoid personality disorder tend to be very indifferent to social relationships, take pleasure in few activities, don’t show much emotion, and are
almost always what you would call a typical loner. They often continue their adult life living with their parents instead of marrying.


Sophia
white angora jumper 
Vanessa Bruno AthÉ

"But beneath the surface of the digital self-portrait there is no ego, no being, to discover, only a deception, a learned expression, a demand, and a deep valley of meaninglessness." "THE DIGITAL SELF-PORTRAIT" BY MIRNA FUNK

Why do we enjoy it so much, to photograph

ourselves again and again? Why do we want

to capture every situation, every moment, and

every sensation? Because we are addicted to

the sight of ourselves, to our own existence?

Or because these things are a source of anxiety

– because we cannot be sure of our own

existence unless there is someone watching,

someone responding, and thus giving us life.

“For Hegel the subject was not feasible as an

individual self-consciousness [sic] without its

dialectical counterpart (general public).” In

other words, there can be no subject without

an observer. We do not exist until our existence

has been confirmed by others.

"LEADERS LIVE BY CHOICE, NOT BY ACCIDENT." (Mark Gorman) - An afternoon with Sabine Lisicki

“Even when I met her personally for the first time I noticed her target-oriented commitment. (...) her overwhelming joy she used to show. (...)

She exudes confidence, shows a thrilling match and spectacular rallies.”

(Steffi Graf on Sabine Lisicki)

German professional tennis player.

Started at the age of seven.

Ranked 14th worldwide in 2012.

Serve 210 km/h (while Maria Shaparova, ranked first place, serves 190 km/h).

She is ambitious.

She lets nothing come in her way.

She is beautiful.

We asked.

She answered.

Straightforward.

As her shot.

The whole interview after the jump.

"TO BE GIVEN THE LABEL "PLUS-SIZE" WAS MOST LIKELY THE HAPPIEST DAY I CAN REMEMBER." - THE STORY OF KAROLIN WOLTER

After three years of successful runway modeling for top labels like Marc Jacobs, Lanvin, and Yves Saint Laurent, Karolin Wolter was tired of rigid diets and self-loathing in front of the mirror, so she made a risky decision. She became a plus-size model.

Read her story written in her own words after the jump. 

"I AM JUST THERE TO GIVE STRUCTURE TO A PREFABRICATED FANTASY" IN A CONVERSATION WITH KAMILLA FILIPCIKOVA

Kamila Filipcikova was discovered at the age of 14 in her hometown Bratislava. Since then the slovakian girl made it on the cover of Vogue Italia and danish Rodeo Magazine, worked together with Juergen Teller and Steven Meisel and appeared in editorials for magazines such as W, Cover and Love Magazine. Having that in my mind it's quite surprising getting to know her in her outstanding appearance. Outstanding - in a very down-to-earth way. We met Kamila for a talk about the ego from the view of a full-time-model, her experiences and the craving for the simplest things in life. The fact that we had to capture her (superficial) beauty trough a photo series aswell becomes unquestionable. 

Read the whole interview after the jump. 

"THE ONLY THING THAT IS OBSCENE IS CENSORSHIP." (Craig Bruce) Introducing: "Censored Dresses" by David Siepert

David Siepert is a German artist living in Switzerland, whose works deal with human behavior within environments marked by processes of change and tension. The concept for his latest work originates from the artist’s time spent in the Middle East, performing research in places such as Lebanon, Egypt, Bahrain, and Dubai. It was here that he first encountered the censorship of advertisements in women’s fashion magazines. These are not cases of straightforward censorship, where the magazines themselves are prevented from being published because of their content. The magazines appear for public purchase via translational processes between cultural conventions of dress — painstakingly applied to individual images. With magazines that are produced in these Middle Eastern countries, or specifically for them, these adjustments are created pre-press. However, in the case of imported Western magazines, which are available uncensored, it is usually the shop owner who takes responsibility for the images. Often whole pages will be removed from magazines, because too much of woman’s skin is shown. But some shopkeepers take it upon themselves to cover these exposed areas by hand, using felt-tip pens or markers. These cases of self-censorship, as the images themselves are not prohibited, can be seen as acts of translating cultural conventions. By covering areas that are shown unclothed, fashion is adjusted and transformed into the image of something that does not exist in reality. Chosen from a collection put together over several years, several of these aesthetically and culturally sensitive alterations formed the starting point for the ‟Censored Dresses” project. Working with the concept of fashion producing fashion, Siepert took the hand-censored fashion advertisements to professional dressmakers in Cairo’s Islamic quarter and asked them to recreate the clothing as depicted. Adding another dimension to the translational process, these instructions left the practical parameters of the design open to the women’s interpretation. The finished dresses are a product of a complex relationship between different cultural conventions, which are simultaneously mediated through individual interpretations.  The final phase of the project consisted of a performance in the form of a fashion show with the dresses at Zurich’s historic Cabaret Voltaire in May of 2012, followed by exhibitions both in Zurich and Beirut. Photographs of models wearing the dresses, referencing the conventions of fashion photography, were part of the exhibits. Translating the work back into the arena of publishing, an editorial fashion shoot with the dresses was done, thus treading on the mixed territory between fashion, advertising, copyrights, and art.

Read the interview we did with David Siepert after the jump.