Through out history the fashion and photography industries have heavily influenced each other. Fashion photography has been able to capture styles throughout the decades with the help of models and designers. As important as the fashion itself, models have been working in order to display a life style that allows designers to sell their products. One of the first photographer's that began shooting in the fashion photography genre was Edward Stiechen. In 1911 his photographs were published in Art et Decoriation, a French magazine. His career in the genre continued to grow throughout his lifetime. In 1923 he was the chief photographer at Conde Nast, a media company in New York. The same year Vanity Fair named him "the greatest of living portrait photographers"(Ewing, 2014). His images were so iconic because of his ability to merge fashion and fine art photography. One of his most successful images was of Gloria Swanson for Vanity Fair taken in 1924. His work ultimately influenced fashion photographers to come and had a great impact merging the two industries. .
Edward Stiechen, Actress Gloria Swanson, Vanity Fair, 1924.
In order to successfully create fashion photography images one of the key aspects are the models. In 1923 the first modeling agency opened in New York City called The John Robert Powers Agency (Johnrobertpowers.net, 2013). From that point on the modeling industry has grown in importance and demand. This industry has changed heavily through out the decades. The women being paid to model set standards for what is considered to be ideal woman of the time period. The encouraged appearances, weight and height continuously change through out history and continue to do so. Women modeling in the past would never be considered to model currently and vice a versa. .
When modeling and fashion photography began to rise and become successful industries it was post WW1. During that time in history people we're living very opulent lifestyles and enjoying celebrations to commence the end of the war.
