I was always looking at Helmut Newton photos with the Le Smoking suit and Stella Tennant in Self Service magazine. It was never just about an ultrafeminine woman for me.
Like Robert Mapplethorpe, Helmut Newton, and so many others before me, sexual imagery has always been a part of my photography.
I wear all my T-shirts from Helmut Lang with the holes in the elbows, which people always speak of. When my husband gets a hole in his sweater, at his elbow, he says, "It's very Helmut Lang!"
If I am in fashion, it is really due to very few designers that I admire - not because I don't like the rest, or that the rest are not beautiful, but because I am very selective. I adore Versace. I adore Helmut Lang, despite the fact that it's over.
The great German scholar Helmut Thielicke once said that a person who speaks to this hour’s need will always be skirting the edge of heresy, but only the person who risks those heresies can gain the truth.
I suppose I like to set myself projects that are tight, focused, and then challenge myself with how broad I can go within that limited aspect. I think to Helmut Newton and film director, Federico Fellini - the added level of eroticism, the arousing message - and how it was possible for them to keep their signatures over so many years.
