Photography and Text by Noel Zheng, Copyright 2018
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The Danielle Collection
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The premise of this project was to create a “Fashion Ad Campaign”—although the outcome became more of a critique on fashion ad campaigns of today.
I was fortunate enough to travel to the outskirts of Pennsylvania during ripe Autumn with a group of friends, all but one of whom were members of the student run fashion magazine, The WALK Magazine. During this time, we photographed each other, against the rare suburban background (rare to Philadelphia, that is). From this short experience, I generated these eight images to critique not only our actions that day, but to apply the same critique to fashion—in particular, fast fashion.
Danielle Goh is a good friend of mine, and a very down-to-earth person. However, the fashion ad campaign I have generated very much so carries the connotation of haute-couture.
This discrepancy between what is genuine and what is fabricated was very prominent. Hence, the “slogans” of “The Danielle Collection” features a few of the day to day things she says. The often quirky quotes provide an interesting juxtaposition against the more generic, avant-garde fashion ad campaign shots. By doing so, there is an attempt to challenge what a fashion ad campaign stands for, or at least, remind the viewers that not all ads are as they seem—not all roses are red. And who knows, maybe when a supermodel on the cover of Harper’s Bazaar stares nonchalantly away into the vast expanse of a lake during the blue hour, she really is just thinking about peanut butter.
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About The Author: Noel Zheng is a Sophomore majoring in Architecture, University of Pennsylvania, Class of 2020. To access additional articles by Noel Zheng, click here: https://tonywardstudio.com/blog/noel-zheng-untitled-bare/