He’s been accused by a string of young models of being a sexual predator, but Terry Richardson has again denied he ever forced girls into compromising positions for his photos.
‘When people call me a pedophile and fucking bullshit, that’s a horrible thing to say about someone,’ Richardson says in a lengthy profile piece in New York Magazine, in which the publications speaks with the famed photographer, his friends and assistants, as well as several anonymous fashion industry insiders.
A controversial fashion photographer who's shot A-listers and models for the covers of worlds biggest magazines, as well as the campaigns of major fashion brands, Richardson has been at the centre of a storm of allegations by models who have said they were forced into shooting graphic sexual photographs. Many models have spoken about feeling as though they could not refuse to do as Richardson asked, based on the fact that he is such a major figure in the fashion world.
Some of Richardson's friends, however, are publicly standing by him.
‘You’d find a line down the block to talk about how generous and warm and gracious he is,’ Jared Leto offered, while Danish supermodel Freja Beha says: ‘I think when you put yourself in front of a photographer, you have to have a clear idea of what you’re willing to do and what not.’ The model adds that [he] ‘has never taken me anywhere I’ve felt uncomfortable with. I’d even go so far as to say he’s one of the most sensitive people in the business, who’s quite honest about how he feels.’
Richardson says he's never had to coerce girls into taking provocative pictures and that any shots that were taken were always done willingly: 'When I was taking those pictures. I was very, like: ‘Cool, sounds great, let’s do it, great, okay, sure, great, cool, if not, no problem, never do anything you don’t want to do, of course, I totally respect that.'
Despite the shitstorm that surrounds him and the photographs, he says he has absolutely no regrets about taking the kinds of images that he's taken: ‘I don’t have any regrets about the work at all,' he says, ‘But obviously I don’t ever want someone to feel like that. It was never my intention. But also, people do things, and then they have regrets, and that’s also nothing to do with me. Then don’t do pictures like that again … I’m okay with myself about everything, and that to me is the most important thing.’
In light of the allegations, many magazines have since stopped working with Richardson, as have fashion brands including Target and H&M, who Tweeted that they're currently not working with him.
Picture: Getty
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.