Let’s imagine fashion week. You’re walking into a venue set for a runway show, finding your seat, adjusting your clothes and comfort for the structure of the seat and readying your mind for the grace of the runway. Now let’s imagine the backstage of fashion week. A model is getting her makeup done, putting on the undergarments made special for her look, meditating before she hits the runway and practicing her expression in the mirror. How much of these small details do we remember when the show is over? Despite the hustle and bustle of fashion week, there is an art to those small, forgettable moments. Thanks to the shutter of Landon Nordeman’s camera and his artistic perspective towards fashion moments, we can remember to pay attention. Notorious for capturing visuals in unthinkable places, Nordeman offers a photography book with an elusive view of what happens behind the runways of London, Milan, New York and Paris fashion weeks.
The book, Out of Fashion, drew inspiration from Nordeman’s past photography work with dog pageantry. Who knew that a parallel between a dog show and runway show would ever be drawn? Both entities being full of public adoration and spectacle and both quietly deserving an image of those in-between moments. Of all the fleeting moments that makeup the timeline of fashion week, Raf Simons‘ last Dior show for Spring/Summer 2016 feels like a precious one. The photographer represents this event, along with several others, including an intimate perspective of Grace Coddington’s fiery locks, demanding reflection of our consumption (or overconsumption) of fashion week images.
From the photographers in the press section to the onlookers in the back row, no corner of fashion week goes unnoticed. Elisabeth Biondi, Former New Yorker Visuals Editor, composes the text for the book to delve further into the message within the art of it all. “(Nordeman) truly enjoys the pageantry, the foibles of the style conscious, and the over the top displays of vanity,” Biondi wrote according to i-D Magazine. “They all make up the spectacle for him.”
The book is not set to release until October 2016. It will be published by Damiani and is available for preorder here.