Rankin is a massively influential character to me, he has a love hate relation ship with industry he works in and loves nothing more than to brake down the barriers of fashion. "It's a fantasy world I don't take too seriously""Considering the fashion world as fantasy is interesting to me because i cant seem to take it seriously either, it is a pretentious mine field that is hard to navigate through but if you succeed you get to poke fun and experiment within its boundaries, something i am very keen to do.
Just like Terry Jones he set up a magazine, 'Dazed and confused' is an alternative fashion magazine that has adopted Rankin's way of not taking itself or fashion to seriously, without a sinister approach to the rules and regulations of fashion photography it has opened itself up to young photographers on Flickr and controversial ways of photographing. I have uploaded numerous fashion images to their site over the last year and am yet to be picked up but that wont stop me trying.
I like Rankin's approach to choosing models as well, a lot of photographers concentrate on picking a model that is aesthetically the stereotype of perfect yet Rankin says "the best models are the totally normal ones: Kate Moss, Helena Christensen and Agyness Deyn, for instance". I believe he thinks this because for a start he like to breach through the artificial construct of fashion and secondly because the more normal a model is the more he can draw out realism and expression from them. Normally a model is used to promote clothing and so remains blank and depersonalised but Rankin experiments and creates fashion that could be considered art.
The themes he explores through photography are what most inspires me, he thinks outside the box about what could evoke a reaction and he succeeds in his choices and delivery of these choices. Once the concept is born through a photo he gets the reaction he is looking for and this is something i am definitely going to have to work hard to achieve however it is something i am fully adamant of achieving.
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