Photography by Kayla Rocca

Judge the art, not the artist.
But where do we draw the line?

She asked to be photographed. I didn’t know her, she didn’t know me. In case you hadn’t heard: Designer John Galliano (of the house of Dior, most [in]famously) was publicly skewered for anti-Semitic (and other racist) comments caught on tape. While some fashion insiders waited patiently for the next scandal to unfold or dismissed it entirely (hello there, Pat Field and Franca Sozzani), the rest of the world called for his head. Dior canned him, and Natalie Portman followed suit. The show, however, went on without him. But does that mean admirers of his work, and of his legacy (because I guess he’s already left it), have stopped looking? John Galliano is a relic of the couturier world. Until I saw this, I had all but forgotten about him. Not as a racist, but as a scandal and a headline, and, more dishearteningly, as an artist. Like Hilary Alexander, I am not for excusing his behaviour, and the road he walks on now must be walked alone. Sure, you can choose whether or not to look at his art going forward. She told me, this woman, that we shouldn’t forget – not about him, or about what he’s done for us, for fashion, for culture. Would that be the real tragedy here?