Fashion Neurosis with Nick Knight

Nick Knight is among the world's most influential and visionary image makers and the founder and director of award-winning fashion film website SHOWstudio.com. He has consistently challenged conventional notions of beauty and is fêted for his groundbreaking creative collaborations with leading designers, including Yohji Yamamoto, John Galliano and Alexander McQueen. Nick Knight has produced advertising campaigns for clients including Burberry, Chanel, Fendi, Christian Dior, Lancôme, Swarovski, Tom Ford, Calvin Klein and Yves Saint Laurent. He has longstanding and ongoing creative relationships with various musicians, producing award-winning music videos for Björk, Lady Gaga and Kanye West. 

His first book of photographs, Skinheads, was published in 1982, winning a DandAD award in 1996. He has since produced a twelve-year retrospective titled Nicknight, Flora, a series of pressed flowers and plants from the Natural History Museum, and Nick Knight, a retrospective monograph published by Harper Collins in 2009. 

His work has been exhibited worldwide at various prestigious institutions, including Tate Modern, Victoria & Albert Museum, Saatchi Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, MoMA, Gagosian Gallery and Albion Barn. In 1993, Knight produced a permanent installation, Plant Power, for the Natural History Museum in London, subsequently on display for 15 years. 

Nick Knight launched SHOWstudio in 2000, with an aim of showing the entire creative process from conception to completion. SHOWstudio has pioneered fashion film and is now recognised as the leading force behind this medium. Since its inception, SHOWstudio has worked with the world's most sought-after filmmakers, writers and influential cultural figures to create visionary online content resulting in the moving image, illustration, photography and the written word.

In this episode of Fashion Neurosis, Bella Freud and Nick Knight discuss sharing a pair of silver Doc Martens with school friends, how Lo-Fi can show the cracks and the beauty in photography, and how failure is an essential part of success.

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