She is from the great era of supermodels, these models with sculptural physique whose first names were known by heart to teenage girls in the 1990s.
Nevertheless, Tatjana Patitz remained a top apart on this scene.
"She was much less conspicuous than her peers - more mysterious, more grown-up, more inaccessible - and that had its own allure," said famed American Vogue
editor
Anna Wintour.
A culture of discretion that encouraged a certain magnetism.
The eye of German fashion photographer Peter Lindbergh, who died in 2019, was one of the first to capture it by photographing it in the 1980s. In January 1990, he immortalized it alongside Naomi Campbell , Cindy Crawford, Linda Evangelista and Christy Turlington,
British Vogue
who wanted her look at the upcoming 1990s.
The result gives rise to a black and white photo of these five young models, taken in the streets of New York.
"I wanted a new look, stripped of all that heavy hair, those perfect make-ups that made the looks of the 1980s... Then they became supermodels.
The same year of this
Vogue
cover , George Michael chose these five girls to feature in his music video, and then they walked for Versace.
It is this sequence – the cover, the video of George Michael, the Versace show – which made them stars”, had confided Peter Lindberg to
Vogue
in 2013, returning to the favorite shots of his career.
Read alsoCarla Bruni, Cindy Crawford, Naomi Campbell… The return of supermodels at Versace
The Top Model years of Tatjana Patritz
In images, in pictures
See the slideshow10 photos
See the slideshow10 photos
If all choose to settle in Paris or New York so as not to miss any opportunity, Tatjana Patitz, she moves away from the agitation, the scandals, and finds refuge in California, in the United States.
This does not detract from its presence on the catwalks of Fashion Weeks.
She marched for many luxury brands such as Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent, Versace, Valentino, Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein... In 1993, she performed in an anti-fur campaign launched by the Peta association alongside models Emma Sjöberg, Heather Stewart-Whyte, Fabienne Terwinghe and Naomi Campbell.
This shoot marks the beginning of a long collaboration with Peta, and signals the step towards distancing oneself from the fashion industry.
"I always thought [fashion and modeling] wasn't what I was into.
was;
that was what I was doing.
It didn't define me.
Living here and coming back to this place has been like a sigh of relief, in a way,” Tatjana Patitz said in 2009 to the
Guardian
, discussing the comfort she found in returning home to California, and roaming the surrounding wilderness, with her now 19-year-old son Jonah.