An eclectic and ironic style influenced by Tokyo’s Harajuku girls and beautiful cheekbones may be two perfect attributes that describe model Iekeliene Stange. But there’s actually more to her than beauty and a distinctive sense of style.
Born in 1984 in the Netherlands where she was discovered when she was a multimedia design student, Stange has appeared in many catwalk shows, advertising campaigns and magazine covers and editorials. Yet becoming the face of Sonia Rykiel and Burberry Black Label, gracing the covers of many international editions of Vogue and working with famous photographers such as Mario Testino, Tim Walker, Steven Meisel and Steven Klein, wasn’t maybe as exciting for Stange as launching her own photography exhibition.
“I Like Ponies”, an event entirely based on Polaroid shots, opened at the end of January at Berlin’s projektGALERIE and arrived in London yesterday. A few selected images from Stange’s exhibition can be admired until Saturday at The Horse Hospital alongside Dutch fashion artist and friend Victor de Bie's paintings during the event entitled “Umfeld”.
At times inspired by de Bie’s paintings, Stange’s photographs are very different from the glossy images she’s been featured in or from the backstage pictures she loves to take at catwalks.
The young woman with a pensive face smoking a pipe and wearing a stack of hats on her head, the girl in a bunny mask and Winnie The Pooh frock standing in front of a graffiti-ed wall or the boy reclining on a shed with a green mountain in the background, represent windows opened on everyday life, with a little touch of playful surrealism added and, in some cases, a narrative imbued with the sinister undertones of children’s fables.
After graduating from the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in 2001 and doing internships with various fashion designers, Victor de Bie decided to focus on painting. In his work de Bie often combines arty inspirations such as Magritte and Le Douanier Rousseau with less refined references, such as the 80s and popular culture.
Characterised by bright and vivid colours and by an apparently coarse and infantile style, de Bie's paintings are usually funny and alarming and retain a sort of dreamlike quality about them.
The very brief interview with Iekeliene Stange that follows is an extract from a longer interview that will be featured in the next issue of Zoot Magazine (Spring/Summer 09 – available in early May).
Question: When did you first start taking Polaroids and what prompted you to use this medium?
Iekeliene Stange: I started using Polaroid around 4 years ago as a way to keep little memories of friends, places and happenings.
Q: How would you describe your photographs?
IS: At the moment I have a big variety. The Polaroids I have been exhibiting so far show my absurd view of the world and are very surrealistic and playful. Besides this I am very much interested to head into a more photojournalist/documentary direction and I’m excited about the future possibilities that such genre might open up for me.
Q: Model or artist: which of these jobs do you like best?
IS: I don’t consider myself an artist. Yet if I were a proper artist, I would probably prefer it to being a model as art gives you a bigger creative outlet.
Q: What’s the most challenging aspect of being a model in nowadays’ fashion industry?
IS: It’s not as glamorous as it used to be. Most of the girls these days are just young teenage girls who want to make a bit of money so they can continue with what they want to do in the future. 
Sometimes it can be a lot of hard work, though, with little time for yourself, which makes it difficult to plan anything. I have learnt to distance myself from it and managed to separate my career from my private life, though sometimes they inevitably end up blending together.
Q: What inspires you in your life?
IS: Different people I meet through my travels, a mixture of so many cultures all with different interests, traditions and ways to express themselves. I have some very inspiring friends as well.
“Umfeld” is at London’s Horse Hospital until 4th April 2009.
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