1677519071 Bethann Hardison Mentor to Naomi Campbell and Iman who brought

Bethann Hardison: Mentor to Naomi Campbell and Iman, who brought diversity to the runway

Naomi Campbell and Iman call Bethann Hardison “Ma” because she’s like a second mom to them. She didn’t discover the models or even represent them through her modeling agency; She just protected them, cared for them and helped them when they faced hate, rejection and racism in the fashion world. “I met her when I was 15; [I had] just arrived in New York and I remember saying to her, ‘I don’t know if I want you as an agent or as a friend for life.’ I chose the latter,” recalls Campbell in the documentary Invisible Beauty, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. The film tells the life story of model, agent and activist Bethann Hardison.

“She’s the godmother of fashion,” says Tracee Ellis Ross at the beginning of the film. “Whether people know it or not, she’s changed the way we define beauty.” In fact, Hardison doesn’t like the word beauty at all. She is uncomfortable with the concept, which continues to represent the standards and boundaries she has been fighting since she started modeling in the late 1960s, because she continued to act as an agent for other models in the 1980s and 1990s.

Bethan Hardison.Bethan Hardison. SUNDANCE INSTITUTE

Hardison wrote and directed the documentary himself. She tells her own story through archival footage and on-camera interviews with herself and her friends in fashion and entertainment, including Willi Smith, Campbell, Iman, Zendaya, Bruce Weber, Fran Lebowitz, Whoopi Goldberg and Pat Cleveland. The film serves as the audiovisual portion of a written treatise that Hardison is completing. “I have to tell my life story, I owe it to the community,” she says in her New York apartment. We must “look back to move forward,” she insists. At 80, she has no intention of slowing down; she is convinced that her activism against discrimination for equality is even more necessary today than it was in her heyday three decades ago. “We’ve come a long way today, but we’ve come so far that I fear we’ll do a 180º turn and go backwards,” she says. Hardison’s concern is valid because she’s experienced it before.

Born in Bedford-Stuyvesant, a black neighborhood in Brooklyn, to a Muslim “and intellectual” father and a “dancer and celebrity” mother, Hardison was sent to an all-white high school in a different part of New York. Far from a traumatic experience, she discovered that she could stand out from the crowd: “I was the first black cheerleader, the first black athlete…” It didn’t take long for her to become part of the hip Manhattan beatnik scene of the 1960s occurred. Hardison was discovered by African American designer Willi Smith, a major name in the industry. She went to the elite Versailles fashion show with Smith and a group of models, both black and white. The white royal family of Europe, led by Princess Grace of Monaco, applauded Hardison enthusiastically.

She returned to the United States as a star. “That seemed impossible for a black woman with an almost androgynous look,” says photographer Bruce Weber. “She didn’t look like anyone [else].” According to author Fran Lebowitz, Hardison was particularly different from all of glamorous, party-loving 1970s New York, “because she was the only one who had a son … We were at Studio 54 and Bethann said, ‘I’m leaving; I have Kadeem to take care of.’”

Motherhood prompted Hardison to give up her career as a global supermodel. She decided to become an agent, discovering new talent and representing other models. From the start, her agency was characterized by “having personalities” and included models of all backgrounds, races and profiles: Farida, Bonnie Berman, Veronica Webb, Katoucha, Nick Kamen, Ariane, Roshumba and her biggest star, Tyson Beckford, who was it first black model to sign exclusively with a major fashion brand, Ralph Lauren.

Hardison represented models of all backgrounds and races and experienced inequality first hand. “A black model can charge $700 for a shoot, while a white model can get $3,500 for the same job,” she said at a press conference for the Black Girls Coalition, which she founded in 1988 and co-presented with Campbell and Iman. By directly denouncing the fashion and beauty industry, she has been able to increase the presence of other beauties in campaigns and on the catwalk over the past decade.

A still from the documentary Invisible Beauty.A still from the documentary “Invisible Beauty.” BRUCE WEBER

Feeling that she had fulfilled her role and was tired of the industry, she retired in 1996, closing the agency and going to Mexico. But without her in battle, it took little time for the fashion world to reverse its progress. The documentary explains it like this: The fall of the Berlin Wall led to a boom in Russian beauty. First, Miuccia Prada, followed by Calvin Klein and then the other brands, started hiring only “very young, ultra-thin, white” models. “No Black, No Ethnicity” was a policy given to modeling agencies in writing. “Diversity was traded for uniformity,” says Hardison, who took four years to respond and return to the front lines of activism. She held a large press conference and issued a manifesto naming names and demanding accountability.

Liya Kebbede, Campbell, Iman, Veronica Webb, Tyra Banks, André Leon Talley… They all joined Hardison. As are many others. In response, Franca Sozzani, the editor of Vogue Italia, produced an issue dedicated specifically to black talent and beauty. The edition sold out and had to be reprinted in Italy, Germany, the US and the UK; It was an unprecedented success.

Today, Hardison is celebrating all of those advances. She is also reflected in the fact that she is now enjoying a new golden age, recognized by her contemporaries and younger generations alike. “Without her, I wouldn’t have had the opportunities I’ve had in this job I love. It’s that simple,” says Zendaya. But you have to keep going. “I don’t see the ending,” says Hardison. “I always say I don’t help black people; I’m trying to educate and help white people.”

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