September 23, 2010

‘Picture Me’ Gives Models a Voice

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Last year I did a q&a with runway model Sara Ziff, who co-created the documentary Picture Me, which showed the fashion industry from the model’s point of view. It’s a strange place: on one hand, modeling was fun and Ziff was out-earning her father, a university professor, by her early 20s. On the other hand, designers treat the models like robots, sexual assault is rife, and there’s no protection to 15-year-olds who step off the plane from Brazil speaking little English and knowing no one but their agent. Ziff is now a student at Columbia University, but still models. “Picture Me” is her first film and is now in theaters in New York and Los Angeles, and will be released nationally next week. Trailer below.

 

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

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So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

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