ISSUE 4 // 2011
ISSUE 4 // 2011
!"#"$%&'(")"$"*'+,-'./012&$3&40'5"61'7,8'9,:"$'&1'1;"'1"-:"2'&<"' ,='>?@'7;2""'*"&20',-'A&-"00&'./013-'B,CD"'1&$D0'1,';"2'&E,/1'$3="' &0'&'0*#E,$',='8"2="C13,-@'F"'&0D":'1;"'#,:"$'G&$0,'&'E/::3-<'&21301H' 1,'3$$/012&1"';"2',+-'&213C$"'+31;';"2'3:"&$0',='8"2="C13,-'E"=,2"'&-:' &=1"2';"2'I,/2-"*'1;2,/<;'1;"'=&0;3,-'3-:/012*@' Demelza and I met by chance on a filthy sleeper tour bus through our respective boys for a few hours a couple of years ago. The boys didn’t last but, despite living at opposite ends of the globe, our friendship has. While chatting with Demelza over Skype about an article I was trying to find an angle for on the subject of perfection, we fell into a lengthy discussion on the subject, and without realising it, I had my article. At a glance Demelza and her life might seem perfect. Crowned most beautiful girl in the Antipodes at sweet 16, waltzed into a world of fame and fortune, with skin that reflects light like the surface of the moon (even at 7am over a webcam), she’s a saleable symbol of perfection. But being the muse is not the languid, beautiful experience the smoke and mirrors (or windmachines and Photoshop) make it out to be, and despite all her perfection, her hips were ‘too big’. All the way through the show she was told to lose weight and so, as a 16-year-old is bound to do when listening to those who surely know so much better than she, she lost weight. “I struggled with being told I was too big to be a model and that I didn’t have the right measurements and if I only lost this much weight then everything would be fine.” What’s interesting about this is that she’d never had a problem with the way she looked before she was recognised by the industry, something which should (should) have been
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a confidence boost rather than the opposite. But being in that microcosmic alternate universe skews perception. “Everything gets magnified but nobody else really sees it. So people on the outside tell you you’re fine and people in the industry tell you you’re not and it’s like a tug of war in your own mind trying to work out who’s right and who’s wrong and how far you take something before it becomes quite detrimental to you. Being 16, my mind was so malleable to all the criticism that was being thrown at me.” De refers to ‘hindsight’ a lot as we talk; not with regret but with learning. She’s made a study of her mistakes and the result is a mature young woman, wise beyond her years, who doesn’t preen and is, remarkably perhaps under the pressure, level-headed and happy with her figure. It would seen that she’s managed to lash, tether and tame the ridiculous stamping beast of the fashion industry and, as though it were a naughty, wailing child, she just ignored it until it piped down. She’s continued to do things her way, calmly and without a song and dance or indeed a soapbox. “I’ve always had a womanly figure and I never want to get rid of that. I’ve come to an understanding with the industry that I’m in. Things aren’t going to change, I’m one person and I’m not going to be able to make a big difference. But I always feel that as long as I’m doing it on my own terms then at least I’m doing something.”
So, as a saleswoman of perfection, are we being scammed or does the product exist? “No. I think there’s this weird crazy ideal that people have figured, but I don’t know where it’s come from and I don’t know who decided that that’s what everyone should look like. When I was at New York Fashion Week last year one of the MUAs (make-up artist) was telling me that the average age at fashion shows was 14! It seems so strange to me, when did that become ok? That’s the ideal of perfection that we’re meant to live up to and it’s an unobtainable thing.”
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So it seems that we’re all buying into a willo’-the-wisp… or are we? Demelza’s closing insights are the most intriguing considering all that’s gone before, which might have hinted at a contempt for perfection and admission that it’s unobtainable. So should we stop buying into beauty? Should the fashion industry pack up its concealer and show us reality? “I don’t know that people would like it if things changed. I think people like the aspiration. I think they need it. In a weird way I think people need that sort of drive in their life to aim for something else.” I find I’m inclined to agree. Perfection may be fantasy, but she’s also my dear friend and she’s perfect whether on a billboard, or on my webcam at 7am. The ultimate irony, and our parting shot is this… Demelza has finally lost those pesky inches from her hips (quite naturally we should add) and as soon as she did, her bust increased by several sizes. Imperfection’s got to go somewhere it would seem. Although I doubt everyone feels as hostile to those extra inches as the fashion industry is bound to do
WORDS
Vanessa Austin Locke ILLUSTRATION
Demelza Reveley
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