In person, Yvan Rodic displays the sort of artful dishevelment and casual indifference you’d expect from a cool young Frenchman. The photographer behind the popular style blog Facehunter, he sees himself as part of a shift in the youth zeitgeist, and true to the site’s name, his images are more about people than the clothes they’re wearing. His pictures can now be browsed offline in a tome titled, naturally, Facehunter (Prestel, $32). FASHION caught up with Rodic in Toronto when he was in town to give a talk to the photogenic fillies from The Society, and we quickly learned that his rumpled appearance belies impassioned opinions.
How do you go about selecting your subjects? “I see someone that for some reason I find special. I think if I have to analyze it, it’s based on feelings; [if I’m] amazed or seduced, or attracted in some way. I think it starts with self-confidence.”
Do you find, from season to season, that there are overt changes in the clothes you see? We have fall and spring seasons in fashion—do you feel that? “Obviously that’s an artificial thing. You see a difference depending on the climate, the weather. But recently, the evolution is much more complex and progressive than a biannual trend. The season thing is obviously a mercantile idea to sell collections. The reality is just so much more primitive and blended.”
But a certain number of trends will trickle in, because it’s not as though everyone you shoot makes their own clothes. “First thing: I don’t believe in trends; I don’t know the trends. Some people make a business out of it and it’s very lucrative, but I find it so unrealistic, so naïve. In the internet era, people get inspired by so many things.”
How do you feel the people you shoot use the internet to inform what they wear? “There are people who were literally born with internet or grew up with internet; most of them are reading blogs and don’t buy many magazines. They’re really into the idea of customization, finding their own way. Maybe 10 years ago, people their age were going to magazines. Maybe some of them now read magazines, but it would have less impact because they will spend more time reading blogs.”
Do you think that the trends that magazines and designers and clothing houses introduce…“I don’t think designers are necessarily into trends. It’s a media thing. They are obsessed. They can’t help it.”
OK, so do you think trends hold any purpose in the fashion world? Or do you think that if we did away with them, everyone would dress in something different? “The world will never be six billion extremely radically individual people. We’ve reached a point now where everything is possible as long as you put it on—as long as it looks good on you, it’s fine. I mean, you could say that 10 years ago as well. But 10 years ago you’d have more pressure: ‘This other cut is so out, now it’s only that.’”
Why do you think there’s less pressure now to conform? “It’s an internet phenomenon. In every field of our lives, we want to be able to edit…this is the consequence of the digital culture. Of course, you will somehow have something similar to other people that you relate to, but in a super-editable, super-customized way.”
First published in FASHION Magazine September 2010
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