“One of the original supermodels”. This is how the world’s media defined Tatjana Patitz when they reported on her death late this afternoon. Her agent confirmed that it was breast cancer that led to her death 56-year-old German (but has lived in California for years). Tatjana was one of the cornerstones on which the supermodel phenomenon was built in the early 1990s.
Success in Fashion (and with George Michael)
There really are many moments that made her career a memorable story: for example Nick Kamen’s 1988 video Tell Me, in which the gigantic version of the model treated the singer – her boyfriend at the time – like he was a toy . Or the shooting, always in the same year, by Peter Lindbergwith her and several of her colleagues (including Linda Evangelista and Christy Turlington) on the beach in a white shirt, makeup-free and disheveled, becoming a manifestation of a less artificial and more natural beauty.
Chanel Haute Couture Spring-Summer 1993
Or again the 1990 cover of British Vogue with her, Naomi, Cindy Crawford, Linda and Christy to symbolize the rise of the new supermodels. The five also came together for perhaps the most emblematic video of the ’90s, Freedom! 90 by George Michael, lip sync the song with them.
Not to mention the hundreds of covers, fashion shows, advertising campaigns, from Versace to Armani to Jil Sander, for which Tatyana was the ideal muse.
A photo of model Tatjana Patitz taken by photographer Peter Lindbergh at the opening of his exhibition in 2007
She had recently returned to hit the catwalks for Etro, in Milan, February 2020: to those who greeted her and claimed to be her fans (and there were many), she replied amazed and happy, almost as if she didn’t think the public remembered her could. Instead, she has left a profound and lasting mark on the industry, albeit unlike her peers has always avoided fame the metropolis and the chaos that the fashion world brings with it.
life, career
Tatjana was born in Hamburg to a Latvian mother and a German father, but grew up in Sweden, in Skanör, where her parents moved after a few years. In 1983, at the age of 17, she decided to try herself as a model and took part in the Swedish selection for the Elite Model Look: she came third and won a trip to Paris, where the agency’s European headquarters are located. It starts and never ends.
As always with superstars, each supermodel represented a specific character: Claudia Schiffer was the bomb like Brigitte Bardot, Linda Evangelista was the chameleon, and Tatyana was the beauty of nature – Anna Wintour called her a mix of Monica Vitti and Romy Schneider – who preferred her ranch in California away from all the parties, with her dogs and horses. He actually turned to acting in 1993, first with a role in the film Sol Levante with Sean Connery, then with a cameo in Robert Altman’s Ready-to-Wear, filmed during the Paris fashion shows, playing himself .
Choosing to live away from the limelight has helped make her feel a bit of an outsider, which she’s always gladly accepted because it gave her more time to devote to the environmental cause she’s always supported and encouraged with great commitment long before it became fashionable.
She is survived by her only son, Jonah Johnson, born of her union with Jason Johnson that ended in 2009.
Tatjana Patitz at the launch of the 1995 Pirelli calendar in London,