Heroin Chic

This image by Corinne Day sparked the “heroin chic” fashion trend of which model Kate Moss became a leading light. Heroin chic was a look popularized in mid-1990’s fashion and was characterized by pale skinned models with dark circles under their eyes and jutting bones. This waifish, emaciated and drug-addicted look was the basis of the 1993 advertising campaign for Calvin Klein clothing which featured Kate Moss. Film director and actor Vincent Gallo contributed to the development of this style through his Calvin Klein fashion shoots. The trend eventually faded, it is suspected to be partly due to the death of one of the forerunning fashion photographers of the genre David Sorrenti who died of a drug overdose.
Corinne Day was one of the first photographer’s to bring this kind of style into the world of fashion. Drug addiction was something that had been touched upon by photographers such as Larry Clark and Nan Goldin but they were documenting real life as fine art documentary photographers. Many would argue that it was wrong for these images to be transferred into the fashion world as it is likely that young people will be encouraged to take drugs to look like their model idols and follow the fashion. Others would argue that people are not so easily influenced and although the images suggest that the models are drug addicts the drugs are not explicitly referenced.



-http://www.worldwidewords.org/turnsofphrase/tp-her1.htm
-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davide_Sorrenti
Image: http://www.channel4.com/news/media/2006/11/week_2/09_moss_by_day_gl.jpg