Born in 1977 in Poland, then communist, Malgosia Bela studied music and literature until the summer of her 21st birthday, when, somewhat by chance, she tried her luck as a model in New York. The success was immediate and dazzling. In the 2000s and 2010s, she was omnipresent in magazines, advertising campaigns and on the catwalks without her name becoming known as that of Cindy Crawford because, at that time, the era of super models was over and the identity models are no longer highlighted as in the 1990s.
When a successful model publishes a book about her career, her story often takes a glamorous turn, recounting fashion shows, fame, a world of festivities… Humor is rare. In genre, the work Winter Girl (77 Press, 216 pages, 90 euros) by Malgosia Bela stands out because it is very funny. Amid portraits of her signed by the greatest photographers – Richard Avedon, Peter Lindbergh and Steven Meisel – the Polish woman has brought together ten memories told with the distance and wisdom that her 46 years give her.
Her parents’ distrust of her profession as a model, which they equate to prostitution, and their inability to recognize their daughter when she proudly shows them her first cover of Vogue. His agent who planned two photo sessions for him 24 hours apart, one in Hamburg, the other in New York, and ordered him to invest $10,000 in a Concorde flight to be able to honor both appointments. YOU. Or this absurd shoot where she is asked to pose half-naked in the company of a nervous cheetah who scratches her… Finally, Photoshop will take care of bringing them together. So many episodes that Malgosia Bela returns to with pleasure when we meet her in September in Paris, a few days before the publication of her book.
Why write a book about your career?
I had at home in Warsaw all my archives which were gathering dust and I wanted to make room. My best friend, who is a publisher, advised me to turn it into a book. At first I hated this idea, which seemed very conceited to me. And then, I started to write a column in the Vogue Poland where I recounted memories, and I got a lot of good feedback. I then said to myself that a work which mixed texts and images might be worth it.
Explain the title to us, Winter Girl (“Winter Girl”).
In the summer of 2022, I went through a bit of a tough time: ten fashion shooting projects for summer clothes were canceled one after the other. Something was wrong. To reassure me, my agent told me: “Don’t worry, the customers will be back in November, it’s just that you’re more of a winter girl.” » A way of saying that with my broad shoulders and my angular face, coats suited me better than swimsuits. I realized that I had been told this often. And maybe, after twenty-five years in this industry, it was time to turn the page. Winter is the end of a cycle, the last chapter.
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