Model as Muse

I have a lowbrow proclivity to admit: I love “America’s Next Top Model.” I cannot get enough of Tyra Bank’s modeling competition. Last cycle, I even carefully orchestrated my Manhattan to Long Island commute to make certain I would be home by 7:45, settled down, and in place for the 8:00 start. I can’t even excuse this reality show viewing by likening it to watching a train wreck. I actually like seeing the clothes the girls model. I’m amused by the girls whining about how HARD modeling is and I even get a kick out of watching Tyra swan around the judging room.

Imagine my shock when my lowbrow indulgence actually informed my enjoyment of a highbrow exhibition, “Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion” at the Met. I had no idea that I had learned so much about iconic fashion images and the history of the fashion industry from a reality television show. See team, tv won’t always rot your brain.

Looking at an image from the 1950s of a model in profile, bent over with her arms akimbo, my date exclaimed “Ugh, why is she hunched over like that.” While I trilled at the exact same moment, “Look at those angles!” Nigel, one of the photographer-judges on the show, is adamant that the girls contort their limbs to create more visual interest in an image.

Walking by a wall of Sports Illustrated covers, I started looking for Tyra. As I helpfully informed my date, she had been the first African American model to grace the yearly bikini issue. Sure enough, the cover was there, although I suspect he would have appreciated it even without the historical context.

Strolling along another wall of covers from the late 1970s/early 1980s, I started looking for Janice Dickinson. Sure enough, she was there too. When I mentioned to my date that she was the first supermodel, he naturally asked, “How did she become the first?”

“Oh,” I replied. “She coined the phrase.” I didn’t mention that Janice’s status as the first supermodel was an oft mentioned fact on ANTM, where she had been a judge for a few cycles.

“I see.” He said.

Then because I couldn’t stop myself, I added “She destroyed her face with too much plastic surgery.” I could see him start to wonder how exactly he had been induced to wonder through a fashion exhibition with a woman who could spew idiotic minutia like this. Still, he gamely carried on. Although, really, how hard is it to be a good sport when you get to ogle gorgeous women to your heart’s content?

Even without my hard-won knowledge from Top Model, I would have dug the exhibition. From the very first display—a recreation of Dovima wearing Christian Dior and posed with her arms outstretched next to two elephants—you could tell that the exhibition designer had a field day. The exhibition was exuberantly playful, occasionally reverent, often irreverent, coy, and accessible. The hallway leading into the main galleries were illuminated with photographer’s umbrella-ed lights. Each gallery represented a different decade and each gallery was decorated in the era’s aesthetic—the ‘90s gallery looked like a grunge club with glow-in the dark graffiti on the walls and black lights for illumination. My date and I spent almost as long just checking out the model graffiti on the walls.

Still, he must not have enjoyed himself as much as I thought. He hasn’t call since. I guess I better save geeking-out about model trivia for my girlfriends. Or not.