Liya Kebede in Vogue’s From Here to Timbuktu

by Guest Contributor Brigitte, originally published at Make Fetch Happen

I think I’ve touched on why fashion shoots in “exotic” (read non-Western) locales tend to get under my skin. The main issue for me is the tendency for the photographer to use whatever local is handy as a prop and/or or exploit the model’s own ethnicity if she happens to be non-White. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen British/Jamaican Naomi Campbell dressed as an African villager on the pages of Elle and Vogue.

This kind of shoot is always lazy and sometimes just plain offensive to me but it is a fashion industry staple, just like pictures of models jumping in expensive clothes in American Vogue.

But would the images be as potentially offensive if instead of a white model, a black one was used? Turns out the answer is “sorta” thanks to Vogue’s “From Here to Timbuktu” shoot photographed by Mikael Jansson for their June 2008 issue.

Here are the good things. The photographs are beautiful as is the African model, Liya Kebede. Okay so she’s not from Mali but they get points for not trying to dress her in traditional garments right? Unlike many of the models usually used in these themed spreads, Lebede looks genuinely happy to be in Timbuktu in these vibrant photographs that could conceivable come from someone’s own scrapbook if the person in question was extremely fabulous. There is only one photo of the model in a actual safari jacket (this one priced at $385 by DVF if you are interested.) No spread like this is complete without a safari jacket, is it?

What really got my attention with this pictorial was the travel diary, written by Sally Singer, which accompanied it. Singer, who describes Timbuktu as a “sandbox at the end of the Earth” that feels to her like the “most priviledged of all playgrounds.” Her tone does in words what wasn’t quite captured in the photographs, that this country exists solely for the amusement of Westerners that can afford to travel there, it is a playground full of interesting children who are just dying to take one’s perfectly manicured hand and show you around the place. One major difference is that thanks to designers like Oscar de la Renta who has “expertly crafted” mudcloth into his Spring ‘08 collection, everyone wearing the traditional textile in Mali looks like they’ve “stepped off the Dries Van Noten catwalk.” She even takes calling her local guide Oscar as an homage to the designer because of the tabard mudcloth garment he is wearing. There’s no mention of what his real name is.

I must say that I agree with her , it is a relief to take pictures of locals and not have their outfits clash with yours. For example, my husband and I were in Paris last month and I had to spend countless hours on Photoshop editing out all those unsightly natives wearing last season’s Agnes B. Quel horreur!

Update: To clarify, Liya Kebede did not make the comments referenced above. Liya Kebede was in the photo shoot. Sally Singer was the author of the travel diary which accompanied the photo shoot. – LDP

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Comments

Daomadan wrote:

I always think of my mother who was raised poor and on a farm seeing Martha Stewart on TV making corn husk dolls. My mom took one look and said, “We didn’t make corn husk dolls because they were crafty, we made them because we were poor!” And promptly stormed out of the room.

That’s what phrases like “everyone wearing the traditional textile in Mali looks like they’ve ’stepped off the Dries Van Noten catwalk.’” remind me of. As if now that some rich, famous designer has “discovered” it…that it now matters. This has been going on for centuries and this is just another form of it. Yuck.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 8:05 am ¶
macon d wrote:

Fascinating post, thank you. Just goes to show, a person doesn’t have to be white to act white.

This was awesome snarkiness:

I must say that I agree with her , it is a relief to take pictures of locals and not have their outfits clash with yours. For example, my husband and I were in Paris last month and I had to spend countless hours on Photoshop editing out all those unsightly natives wearing last season’s Agnes B. Quel horreur!

Posted 22 May 2008 at 8:54 am ¶
Ali wrote:

I can’t believe she called the guide by another name! And then told us all about it! WTF! Being called “outside of” one’s name by a stranger looking down on you is on my top 10 list of the ultimate disrespects. The fact that she had the nerve not to even mention his given name makes it worse. This speaks so much to the ickiness of her character in my mind.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 9:31 am ¶
BoredKidz!!!! wrote:

i honestly don’t know how to feel. Be offended, be amused, or be excited by the fact that a black model *gasp* is actually being used in a photo shoot.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 10:07 am ¶
NancyP wrote:

Of considerable importance – do the “extras” get paid? Paid a reasonable amount?

I know this has little to do with the *effect of race in media on North Americans*, the focus of the blog, but clearly this pay issue and also the issue of credit (and calling the guide/ organizer by his right name) is pretty crucial in terms of fair labor practice.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 11:01 am ¶
Celeste wrote:

Yeah, the extras should get paid. And not just with a meal or something.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 11:17 am ¶
YamYam wrote:

This raises the idea of the objectification of other cultures and it ends up being, to me at least, the idea of a fantasy land manifested, as presented by the idea of the western traveler or tourist.

Joe Cocker singing about going to “Katmandu,” the end of the Almost Famous – Kate Hudson – the weary traveling groupie, leaving her life as one by flying to….. Katmandu, and any other token scene of Westerners going to Shambhalla. Somehow it’s all the same story, like “Heart of Darkness”: what happens when the Western man leaves his environment and enters a place where everything is “untamed” and different.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 11:44 am ¶
lowercase tasha wrote:

“Update: To clarify, Lisa Kebede did not make the comments referenced above. Lisa Kebede was in the photo shoot. ”

Who cares? Time to cut her mike off anyway. I’m getting tired of Liya Kibede being used as the token, black model, especially when the newer white models get utlilized so often. Liya’s appeal isn’t even as a high fashion model anymore. I’m convinced that the reason why American Vogue uses her as a black quota token is because of her NY charity circuit socialite (cause you know how AV loves socialites)/banker’s wife/would be children’s clothing line designer profile.

There are other black models, you know, new girls! It’s like some of the editors at AV are afraid of the new black girls, so they defer to Liya. She’s considered, AV, Anna Wintour approved, editorially “safe” black. But Liya is not Naomi. Unlike Naomi, I’m tired of seeing Liya. Someone get the hook, and yank this chick out from in front of the camera and off the runway. Get the hook!

Anyhoozle . . .

in regards to the post, I don’t know. I don’t think you can have it both ways, because if this editorial had been shot in Timbuktu with a white model surrounded by Malians, then the argument would probably have been, “oh the native people are being used as props . . .it’s neo-colonialist. . .” The problem arises when you see models of color seldom being represented outside of stereotypical settings. For example, seeing Asian models in American magazine spreads that don’t have anything to do with an Asian theme.

BTW, Brigitte, did you see T travel in NYT last Sunday with Yasmin Warsame on the cover?

Posted 22 May 2008 at 12:08 pm ¶
Renee wrote:

Good job pointing out typical western imperial arrogance.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 1:57 pm ¶
heya wrote:

OK, as a fashion buff, I have to make a few points. The first and most important one is that Vogue magazine does this shit all the time. Last time it involved the Russian model Natalia Vodianova going to Morocco to photograph a spread featuring a variety of white shirts. They are very unapologetically colonialist and orientalist in their mindset. It’s pretty backwards really, but what can you expect from this people?

My main point, however, regards your description of Ethiopian model Liya Kebede as “African.” The same mindset that sees no dissonance in featuring an Ethiopian model on a Malian background, that sees Africa as one singular entity, as if it were a country, is also the same mindset that is behind referring to a woman from Africa not by her nationality but by the name of the continent. Liya is Ethiopian, and Ethiopia is on the other side of Africa from Mali, she is Christian and Malians are mostly Muslim, there is little Liya has in common with Mali or Malians other than they are both in the same huge continent. They speak different languages, worship different gods, live in very different places in the world (Malians and Ethiopians, that is). Plus there is a lovely Malian/South African model, Hawa Diawara, that Vogue could have used for this, but I doubt Vogue would want a real native. That whole “African model” moniker just really jumped out at me, seemed really out of place in your really smart critique. You did misspell her name though (Lebede instead of Kebede).

Anyway, I agree with lowercase tasha: Liya is more of a socialite now, she is more associated with her charity work (helping victims of fistula in Ethiopia), to the point that her Vogue cover a few years back referenced her charity work and not so much her fashion career. Let’s not forget: Liya, the denizen of an upper middle class family from Addis Abbaba, a married mother of two, and the possessor of a multimillion dollar Estee Lauder contract, is laughing all the way to the bank.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 2:17 pm ¶
sfsinger wrote:

You know Anna Wintour is just LAZY! How the heck is she considered soooo important to fashion? Anyway I’m looking forward to the famous or infamous July Italia Vogue with all Black models. Hopefully it won’t be more of this nonsense esp since it’s $20 an issue.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 2:29 pm ¶
Brigitte wrote:

heya’s quote: That whole “African model” moniker just really jumped out at me, seemed really out of place in your really smart critique. You did misspell her name though (Lebede instead of Kebede).

I was attempting to make that point by just calling her African but maybe it didn’t come across in reading the piece the way it did in my head when I was writing it.

I’m sure that to Vogue editors one African is just as good as another one so her actual ethnic origins don’t matter to them. Would this shoot have been done with a Malian or other W. African model? I don’t think so. I agree with lowecase tasha that Liya is the go-to black model at Vogue because her keen features are much more acceptable to them. They’d never used Ajuma in this setting, it would ruin the “getawayfromitall” vibe of the shoot.

As for misspelling her name, that was just a stupid typo on my part. Why is that darn L is so close to the K on the keyboard #@!!

lowercase tasha: BTW, Brigitte, did you see T travel in NYT last Sunday with Yasmin Warsame on the cover?

I didn’t see it but thanks for the heads up, I’ll have to track it down.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 3:00 pm ¶
Treacle wrote:

The privilege. It blinds me.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 3:10 pm ¶
Sobia wrote:

Ugh! How annoying. This reminds me of all forms of appropriating “foreign” cultures for the entertainment and pleasure of the White, Western consumer. Whether it be chai tea (chai means tea so basically “tea tea”), bindis, Hollywood actresses wearing saris at award shows, people wearing ethnic clothing for Halloween etc It is all offensive.

For those of us who grew up in the West as ethnic minorities during a time when our food and clothing were “yucky” and “funny looking” it seems quite offensive that now our food and clothing are “trendy” and “cool.” To us they were always something to be respected. But those in the mainstream didn’t allow it then. Then we were told we were disgusting and backward for eating and wearing what we did. Now the mainstream tells us it’s ok for us to feel cool eating our food and wearing our clothes. Thank you so much Now that you’ve given us the permission….

Posted 22 May 2008 at 5:40 pm ¶
Sobia wrote:

Oh and…

“I must say that I agree with her , it is a relief to take pictures of locals and not have their outfits clash with yours. For example, my husband and I were in Paris last month and I had to spend countless hours on Photoshop editing out all those unsightly natives wearing last season’s Agnes B. Quel horreur!”

Awesome!! Loved it.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 5:42 pm ¶
twentysomething wrote:

@ macon d:

What is “acting white”? Please clarify.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 7:11 pm ¶
J. wrote:

I agree with the above posters, I’m soooo tired of people using the term “African” as if that big continent (which is the world’s second largest next to Asia) is just one small, singular, monolithic country.

I’ve even heard MANY African Americans use that term in that same exact context! As if Ghana and Algeria have NO differences. (Hell, they have different racial makeups!).

Speaking of which, when are people also going to stop pretending that a “True African” (’cause you know it’s one big county) can only have jet-black skin, big lips, broad features and super-kinky hair. Anything else, is “not really African”.

Most West Africans and East Africans do not fit that descripition at all.

I should know, I’m Ghanaian.

Anyhow, I think Liya is a pretty lady. And I’m glad that the lilly-white fashion scene is actually putting a black woman to work. But I agree that the fetishizing is sickening. There’s so many black models, you’d think they’d spice it up and use them just as frequently as they use the white ones.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 9:10 pm ¶
lucy wrote:

I’m sorry to all the haters, but Liya Kebede is probably one of the few relevant working models today. She has probably worked hard to keep this kind of longevity in a profession that in all honest truth can be very superficial. How many models do you know that have taken breaks from runway and still get the big shows when they come back, very few. We could talk all we want about all these new girls (ethnic or not) too, but the mere fact is that 8 years into her career Liya is still pulling out fantastic editorials like this and also for other magazine as well. I mean sure vouge could just use faceless new models (again ethic or not) jumping around just for the sake of it, but if id have to choose between that or having just one picture of liya just standing there, I’d still take that one picture of liya. At least there would be some emotion there.

As for those who question whether she is now considered just the it token ethnic model or a high fashion model, well just look at her fall 08/09 runway list (it’s not the biggest but at least it’s all blue-chip designers) and the fact that she got the May UK Harper’s Bazaar Cover, the Tiffany ads this season, and the Lanvin ads next season.

As for those two posters who dismiss Liya as just another rich socialite. Sure Liya came from an affluent background, which answers why the UN and the WHO would reappoint Liya again as their ambassador for child and maternal health and why she started her own charity. I guess the UN just wanted some rich bleeding heart whose rolling with money to represent their cause. Who really cares about the mortality rate of babies and their mothers in third world countries. As for her charity, of course she should be the one to help out people in her country, why should we, we’re not the one with all the money. I say we do nothing at all, just like normal.

Posted 22 May 2008 at 10:42 pm ¶
lowercase tasha wrote:

@heya

I forgot all about Hawa.

“I mean sure vouge could just use faceless new models (again ethic or not) jumping around just for the sake of it, but if id have to choose between that or having just one picture of liya just standing there, I’d still take that one picture of liya. At least there would be some emotion there.”

@lucy

Thems be fighting words. Yeah guilty, I’m a Liya hater. Like I said, “Get the hook!” And like, if she’s really that relevant, and there’s such emotion in her pictures, how come Italian Vogue is rumored to be going with Iman for the cover of the black model issue of Italian Vogue? I don’t begrudge Liya her wealth or her upbringing, but to me, socialites on the runway . . . that’s not high fashion, it’s commercial. I think it’s great that Liya is lending her profile to the UN, but it’s not exactly anything novel. Even crazy ass Naomi was an UN goodwill ambassador. Lots of people in the media are doing that, and the last truly relevant model turned UN ambassador was Iman. You could arguably make the case that Iman played a huge role in getting the US to intervene in Somalia. No one’s checking for Liya like that.

@Brigitte

Oh, I wasn’t trying to attack Liya’s features or trying to imply that she wasn’t “black enough” or whatever. When I said she was “safe black” I was saying that, in comparison to other black models, she’s been in AV so many times, that she’s a convenient staple. It’s like what sfsinger said, “Laziness.” I recently saw Liya’s May UK Harper’s Bazaar cover, and now normally, I would show support, if a woman of color, particularly a black woman was on the cover of a MSM fashion magazine and maybe buy several copies, but it was Liya, and I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I did it for her AV cover (bought several), but yeah, I have my doubts about whether or not she’s used for print and runway tokenism because she’s so special or because certain people in fashion just don’t want to think to hard.

Black, fashion models are used to appeal to everyone, but black, female consumers especially, and I wonder how many black women relate to Liya, as opposed to a Tyra or a Naomi? I really would like to know how much Estee Lauder product Liya has moved, or if there’s been a real uptick in sales (particularly from black consumers) since she got her contract, because I agree that she may very well appeal to whites more than blacks (at least in the US anyway). You know, I never said to myself, “Ooh, I wanna look like Liya Kebede.” I don’t know many black women who have, but I wouldn’t necessarily attribute that to her East African, Semitic, “white girl dipped in chocolate” look. Iman had a similar look, and we can’t get enough of her! Halle Berry is lighter than Liya, and black women relate to her. To me, Liya’s just not electric. She never made me want to run out and buy something the way Kate Moss or Tyra has. You know, like for example, Tyra put me on to Vicki’s Secret, and apparently a lot of other women too because she reportedly sold more bras and panties than Giselle. None of the models these days, except maybe Agyness Deyn, are style avatars. There are a lot of girls in the UK getting haircuts, wearing Doc Martens, and running around in clothes that don’t match because of her.

Posted 23 May 2008 at 6:55 am ¶
nyc/caribbeanragazza wrote:

Sorry Tyra never inspired me to buy anything. I have never related to her or Halle but Iman and Naomi? def. The latter has issues but she is not boring and at an age when models have hung it up she is still working.

I so agree with you about Agyness.

I just moved to Rome. Trust I will be getting the Italian Vogue the minute it hit my local newsstand. I very curious to see it.

Posted 23 May 2008 at 10:23 am ¶
heya wrote:

Lucy wrote: “How many models do you know that have taken breaks from runway and still get the big shows when they come back, very few. ” I don’t know, maybe Amber Valetta, Erin O’Connor, Stella Tennant, Angella Lindvall, Malgosia Bela, Sunniva, Shalom Harlow, Missy Rayder, and the list goes on. Even Giselle and Natalia V and even Linda Evangelista back in the day have taken seasons off and come back. Many of these girls have taken time off to have children, like Liya has, and have returned to their previously successful careers. Lots of models (who were already very successful) take time off for a variety of reasons and come back successfully. It’s not a rarity at all.

lowercase tasha: Liya has a very typical Ethiopian look. Remember that most Black people in the US and Latin America/CAribbean are descendants from African Slaves from the West Coast of Africa. It’s dipping from a very different gene pool than the one that produced Liya. Just like Sudanese models like Atong Arjok and Alek Wek don’t look like most African-Americans. Not everyone from Africa or of African descent looks the same, which is at heart the point of Brigitte’s post, no? To begrudge Liya because she doesn’t look like the American idea of what Black (African-American) people should look like is a bit disingenous, though. I don’t have anything bad to say about Liya, after all, she’s not a 15 year old prepubescent looking Romanian with a 6th grade education. Big improvement.

Posted 23 May 2008 at 11:25 am ¶
lowercase tasha wrote:

@heya

Yeah, but I’m not discriminating against all models with a typical Ethopian or Somali or East African look, nor am I obligated to like, or want to look like, every model from that gene pool that washes up on our shores. I said, this one (Liya) I don’t care for, and how much discrimination is it anyway, when I said I bought several copies of her AV cover? I buy Iman’s cosmetics. I mentioned Yasmin Warsame. I like Waris Dierie. I’m Liya’d out. Once again, “Get the hook!” Time for the new girls.

Posted 23 May 2008 at 12:20 pm ¶
BluTopaz wrote:

I have to agree with lowercase tasha. It’s not a dislike nor weariness for East African models, for me it’s a weariness of Liya period. Yes she’s a very pretty lady, but imo one aspect of a great model is showing personality as well as the clothing. I’ve never thought Liya conveys any personality on the runway nor in print. However Iman has been giving us spark, flavor and attitude for what, about 3 decades now…

But anyway not to bash anyone… I enjoyed the article here. It would just be so nice to see some of the more obscure Black beauties out here given an opportunity to stand next to African natives and smile vacantly in overpriced clothes

Posted 23 May 2008 at 2:33 pm ¶
london wrote:

& not only that.. the people do not look that happy to have the model interrupting their business for the sake of a fashion shot that they will never see in print…
i swear some of the looks on their faces in this picture are saying ‘wtf?’
they have their own standards of beauty and are thinking this woman being photographed is quite ugly, skinny and light skinned.. and the dress the model is wearing is awful.. actually i personally would rather wear the t-shirt and wrappa and headscarf of one of the women in the background…
they should have done the shoot in the american mid west in a ‘little house on the prairie’ style…

Posted 23 May 2008 at 3:21 pm ¶
Mina wrote:

BTW: did anyone else think “world’s first college town” instead of “exotic distant place” at first when seeing the word “Timbuktu”?

“They speak different languages, worship different gods, live in very different places in the world (Malians and Ethiopians, that is).”

nitpick: “Allah” is Arabic for “God” and observant Muslims worship the same one obsevant Christians and observant Jews do.

Posted 23 May 2008 at 5:10 pm ¶
gorgeous black women wrote:

They could have used Tiguida Sissoko or Hawa Diawara. It’s significantly less insulting when an African or even just a non-white model is used. Vogue adores it’s colonial layouts. They romanticize it frequently.

Posted 23 May 2008 at 10:37 pm ¶
Whitney wrote:

Just to clarify, no, they might have not been able to use another model…. maybe the others were already booked.

I don’t get it. I’ve seen other posts decrying how nonwhite models are rarely ever used, and when they are, everyone has a problem with it. And now a bunch of people are saying that they’re sick of seeing a nonwhite model?

Posted 24 May 2008 at 5:12 am ¶
Whitney wrote:

Another question: Would anyone here be upset if Vogue decided to do a shoot in, say, Sweden, but chose to use a French model instead of a Swedish one?

Posted 24 May 2008 at 7:00 am ¶
Lyonside wrote:

>And now a bunch of people are saying that they’re sick of seeing a nonwhite model?

No, a lot of people are sick of the ONLY time you see a nonwhite model on her own and not in a crowd of white models in the foreground seems to be in a stereotypically foreign situation, often with third world real life people as “props.”

As a commentator said above, were those market patrons and vendors paid for being in the layout?

Posted 24 May 2008 at 11:52 am ¶
Alexis wrote:

@ Racialious: great blog post! In the first sentence you have a typo. It should read: …fashion shoots in “exotic” (read non-Western) LOCALES tend to get under my skin.

@ Daomadan: I know what you mean. I felt the same way when people thought Bo Derek invented cornrows.

@ J: “I’ve even heard MANY African Americans use that term in that same exact context! As if Ghana and Algeria have NO differences.” That’s odd because I know MANY African-Americans who know that Africa is a continent not a country. I’m always saddened by any contention between Africans and African-Americans. Can we not perpetuate stereotypes about each other? Aren’t there enough people doing that?

Posted 24 May 2008 at 6:03 pm ¶
Alexis wrote:

@ BluTopaz: I am fluent in sarcasm, and I didn’t detect any irony when you wrote “African natives”. Surely you meant “African locals”?

Posted 24 May 2008 at 6:11 pm ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:

All typos fixed.

Posted 24 May 2008 at 6:26 pm ¶
Petite Maoiste wrote:

I love this blog!

The agnes b. comment: priceless

Posted 25 May 2008 at 10:45 pm ¶
sandbox wrote:

I want to know if all of these women in the marketplace signed photo releases? The kids? Are they getting paid for the shoot? What did Vogue pay in location fees to the sites where they shot?

Hmm, right. I thought so.

Timbuktu is –as somebody pointed out above–the home to the oldest university in the world. It was also one of the most important centers of trade in precious medals and luxury goods, and a corssroads of religious, philosophical and mathematical scholarship. It’s funny how it has become “the sandbox at the end of the earth.”

Also, Mali and neighboring Senegal are the homes of some of the first “African models” to make it in to Paris Vogue. Even West Africa, or even just Senegal and Mali, forget the rest of the whole region, has a wealth of ethnicities and “looks.” Aquiline noses, wide noses, skin from blue-black to olive, smooth hair that grows long, kinky hair that grows wide. It’s a big and diverse region, and one that has long been at play–in different ways at different times–in the European fixation with “the African model.”

Posted 27 May 2008 at 6:53 pm ¶