Adi Barkan, an Israeli photographer and model agent, became acutely aware of the pervasiveness of anorexia when he interviewed 12 000 females, aged 13 to 24, in a televised search for Israel’s next supermodel. He estimated that between 35% and 40% of these aspiring models were anorexic. This realisation, combined with repeated encounters with the illness, persuaded him to launch a crusade to combat it within his industry.
A committee of the Israeli Parliament, the Knesset, will decide whether to proceed with a Bill to compel model agencies to monitor the health and body mass index (BMI) — the ratio of height to weight — of models. Models would have to undergo regular medical tests to ensure their BMI is 19 or above. The most serious anorexics can have a BMI as low as seven.
If the Knesset passes the Bill, Barkan hopes the effect will be twofold. First, agencies will be forced to confront a problem they have long ignored and, second, only ”healthy” models will be seen on television, in magazines and on billboards.
Barkan worked as a fashion photographer for 15 years before starting a model agency in Israel seven years ago. ”You don’t think about the private lives of the models, you just take the pictures and that’s it. It was only when I had my own agency that I began to see things from a different perspective.”
He admits that anorexia can have a multitude of causes but is convinced that the fashion industry can have a major effect on it. ”If consumers of model services refuse to employ unhealthy women, that will remove part of the motivation to reduce their weight.” — Â