Hillman Photography Initiative

I remember seeing this ad as an art student—it kind of had everything: a post-Carnaby Street, pre-hippie moment with mixed and matched colorful shoes and tights, presenting an edgy story and a sense of unattainable style.

It’s impossible to explain how unbelievably cool Charles Jourdan shoes were back then, and how coveted. None of us could afford them, but I was eventually able to buy a pair of red slip-on moonboots at a 70%-off sale at Macy’s. I wore them to death.

We paid attention to the ads and knew they were something different, but it wasn’t until I moved to New York in 1972 that I understood there was a  “new thing” happening in fashion photography that included work by Deborah Turbeville, Helmut Newton, Chris von Wangenheim, and, of course, Guy Bourdin. Fashion stories were being told, often depicting terrible things done to women—little murder…