Last month, the world of Israeli cultivation shook dramatically.
Beauty priestess Ashley Waxman Bakshi has surprisingly announced to hundreds of thousands of her YouTube followers that after a decade of thriving activity and no less than 1,500 videos, she is about to stop uploading new material to the site.
In an area where Waxman controlled Bakshi almost unquestionably, this is no less than an earthquake.
After all, she was one of the first in the country to recognize the potential of instructional videos on YouTube, and her immense success, culminating in her imitation in "Great Country," has grown over the years to hundreds of blue-and-white students trying to walk her path with varying degrees of success and originality.
"I was the first, I broke all the records, and it's very exciting and stunning," she explains for the first time, "but you have to know when to stop and move on. I will not be on YouTube until the age of 80, and I preferred to make the decision myself. And I'm pathetic. "
The decision to close the camera came, of course, also following the Corona.
"People have said the plague is an opportunity to break out and flourish online, but when you have four children locked up at home - everything looks different."
Explain.
"Suddenly, for the first time in my life, I felt the difficulty of combining parenting with a career. After ten years with a fixed schedule, every Sunday and Thursday, I suddenly did not have time to upload a video.
I felt anxious that I was not up to date, that I was disappointing people, that they would not wait for me - and I would disappear.
I started asking myself if I was doing it out of love or afraid of losing.
"I felt a severe disappointment with myself, because I am very perfectionist. If something small does not go right - I go under the covers. I had a real verbal violence against myself in my head: 'you failed', 'what did you think of yourself'.
"My mind went through upheavals in Corona. I started studying nutrition at the same time, because I felt the need to hold on to something, even though on the outside everything was functioning normally."
Did you share with your followers what you are going through?
"My deliberation on whether to continue or stop lasted a year, and I shared it with my audience. Most of the people, including my husband and Nathaniel Moyal, my public relations man, told me 'you're crazy if you interpret', but such comments make me even more against the current. When I left "At the time, the Ministry of Defense to go to YouTube, I was told I was crazy and still left. This time too."
A brave step, to abandon the place from which you broke out.
"True, but my name as the beauty anchor I built, will never go away, even if I do not succeed in my next thing on those dimensions."
Maybe you found yourself less on YouTube, compared to the alternatives available today?
"In terms of platform, I feel like YouTube has become relevant to very young people, children. My main audience is more on Instagram, which is constantly renewing itself, and on Tiktok, which has jumped significantly. So I'm there. As I get older I feel ridiculous playing a character, I found myself playing on YouTube a character I no longer wanted. "
Was there a decrease in the amount of your views there?
"Yes, but that's not the reason for my decision. Obviously it's frustrating that you invest your soul and it does not get many views, but in the end my content is very niche. Online, as in life, sometimes you are up and sometimes less, and I always prepared myself for the day after. "I was lucky not to become famous as a 12-year-old girl who is passionate about fame. I will always reinvent myself, and in 40 years I will be relevant. Maybe on other platforms, maybe in the print press and on TV."
Makeup instructor in a YouTube video,
The timing of Waxman Bakshi's retirement announcement was chosen almost spontaneously.
"I made a regular video in mid-December, and at the end I just announced that the next one I would go up would be the last. Why that day? I can not say, but I knew that once the message was published, it would take the pressure off me.
How were the reactions?
"I get a lot of messages. Followers write to me that it sucks and that they are sad. But on the other hand, they also let me know that they support me. You disappeared, and they found me elsewhere. "
A successful YouTuber like you abroad could have stopped working a long time ago.
"True, but I have my feet on the ground. I think it's precisely because I did it in Israel - it gave me prominence. And in general, I do not like to think 'what would happen if'."
Do you have an explanation for why you were so successful?
"Good luck, and of course the self-discipline and hard work. I happened to be among the first. Equally someone else could have broken out."
What was your most successful content?
"The videos I made with Sagi Beatbox are really watched, and every year the search for the combination of his Beatbox and my content is repeated. Me and Sagi do not go out to see each other, but we love each other."
Do you feel that in the industry we have praised you less?
"I'm very lonely in the industry. The more I succeeded, the more people did not want to be my friends. I come to events and I do not find myself.
"People assume that whoever grew up on the net is less intelligent, and it bothers me because I feel intelligent. Singers and actors are very fond of their art, but also what I did is art. Although on a different screen, but I did it. And in my case, I was the director, The screenwriter and the producer, and they are not. Without underestimating. "
Do you live in peace with the definition "network star"?
"No, because it puts in a frame. I use the words 'content creator', because for me I'm a content maker."
With fans at a YouTube event, in 2016, Photo: From Instagram
• • •
She is 36 years old, lives in Herzliya, is married to Idan (37), works in a family business in the aluminum field, mother of four: Lia (7), Arie (5), Emanuel (3) and Sofia (two years).
Her parents left Israel for Canada in the late 1970s, where she was born and raised.
Of the family's four children, she is the only one who immigrated to Israel, at the age of 21, after completing a bachelor's degree in business administration.
She volunteered for the Air Force, served as a lieutenant colonel, and after completing an officers' course worked in the budget department of the Ministry of Defense and completed a master's degree in government and the war on terror.
"I grew up in a home that supports Israel, but as a child I did not like the country. We would come here for vacations, and it did me no good," she recalls. "The big change happened to me at a university in Toronto, when I experienced anti-Semitism there."
like what?
"Once someone threw my shoes out the window and said, 'Fly away, you stinking Jew.'
It sounded serious, and I was in the market. "
The biggest turning point in her life occurred in 2003, when she visited Israel as part of the "Birthright" project.
"We saw the separation fence on the way, and I remember saying to myself: Is that the whole story? What's all the noise? Then when I returned to Toronto, I saw a huge display of the fence at the university, and it said 'Apartheid Wall.' "No one is talking about why the fence should have been built in the first place."
So you started explaining yourself?
"I set up a small organization on campus, which did publicity. Isn't it true that last year we all did Bella Hadid 'no-no-no'? So I did things like that 15 years ago. I started explaining what's real about what is presented about Israel and what is not, ".
Is this also the reason why you enlisted for information in Operation The Wall Guard?
"I knew that with my love for the country and my English I had to upload something. I took a video I made two years ago, which is still relevant and topical, and uploaded it again. The amount of reactions was insane, and I realized there was a need for this. An advantage of both language and knowledge, because my master's degree is in the war on terror. "
You also have a not-quite-Israeli look.
"True, but I can suddenly issue you an 'atonement' if you want. A lot of people have written to me, 'You look distinctly European, and your face is proof that Israel is actually occupying, because you are not connected to the lands here.'"
What do you answer to that?
"They do not know that my great-great-grandfather was the chief rabbi in Jerusalem, many years ago, and that my mother was half Egyptian. Another great-grandfather of mine immigrated from Romania during the time of Baron Rothschild and bought land here with his own money."
There was a sense that some of the network's personalities who were making information to the state were acting more in favor of personal traffic and less than ideology.
"Maybe, but it worked in our favor, and that's fine. Bella Hadid also visited Israel to promote herself. If that's a good goal, I do not care what the interest is."
Are you interested in getting involved in politics?
"I am always interested in influencing the political section, but I am not interested in politics and parties. I am interested in promoting social change from within, I am interested in our public relations abroad."
Should Noa Tishbi be afraid of competition?
"Noa Tishbi I will not be because she is busy with propaganda all over, but I try as much as I can. I want my name to be remembered even 200 years after I die, and not because I created the most amazing lipstick in Milan. I want to promote the country and lead a change of tolerance here "Precisely because I love Israel so much and chose to live here, I recognize the things that eat us from within."
for example?
"The mutual hatred in the country bothers me very much. You do not know anyone - you hate him. Whoever does not look like me is against me, whoever did not vote like me is my enemy. These are things that will end us, and thus we will lose the battle.
• • •
In September 2020, Waxman revealed a request for courage that was discovered in a suspicious block field.
"In the days between taking the biopsy and getting the answer I was stressed. I tried to reassure myself that everything would be fine, but I also could not escape the thoughts of what would happen if not, and how I would leave four children alone.
"Luckily the lump was benign, but huge. I had it removed by surgery. A plastic surgeon also took part in the process, and I asked him about the separation of the abdominal muscles. He examined me, and I found out that I have it. To start training, damage was done. I reached a separation of four and a half cm.
As a result, my belly button came out, and I also had a umbilical hernia. "
Why did you suspect in the first place that you had a separation?
"Because I made a dietary change. I lost 24 kg, but my stomach still stood out, and in an illogical section.
Everything went down, and yet I looked fatter.
"After I found out it was a problem, I had surgery."
Speaking of which, what will save the Photoshop phenomenon?
"I personally do not, and even in the campaign of my products there is no Photoshop. I did not burn myself in the lighting, so that they get the real thing from me. I can not sell people bullshit.
"I want them to say I look amazing, but not 'wow, you look injected.' Is that I look better in reality than on Instagram. "
What is your position on lip puffing fashion?
"Excessive levels, and I also posted on the subject. I wrote that even though my lips are not full, it never bothered me. There is a serious problem here, and all the injections and filters make us forget what lips really should look like.
"A lot of women feel insecure because of something marginal. If you feel like injecting, turn around, and I inject between the eyebrows too, but it does not affect my confidence. Before you do, think about what the real reason is for what you are doing."
Aline Cohen was at the center of a storm because of her lips.
"To me it's sad that she felt the need to hide the fact that she did lips. I, by the way, do not think there is an age that is okay and an age that is not. Our preoccupation should not be with the injection itself, but with the question of why. If you have already done, why lie? And if you feel the need to lie, why did you? That is, there is a problem of self-confidence here.
"In the abdominal surgery I did, my skin was stretched along the way, and I could hide and tell that it came only from diet and sports. But in that I would deepen the problem, because anyone who has had births and will not be able to reach my condition will be frustrated."
Have you been debating whether to disclose the surgery?
"On the contrary, I think if I tell the truth and show everyone who has cut me from mouth to mouth to look like this, it balances the forces. In general, the Kardashians have changed the proportions of how people are supposed to look. Suddenly it makes sense to everyone to have a big butt and a narrow waist. ".
Aline Cohen.
"I'm sad she hid," Photo: Daniel Kaminsky
What about nutrition? Healthy is the new black.
"I always thought that if I ate light bread and cottage cheese - it's healthy. But today I understand that these are very processed things. I changed my diet 180 degrees. I was vegan, and now I am not. Today I understand that our great enemy is not fat - but "Sugar. I am not crazy and do not prevent children from eating sweets, but I do educate them on what is healthy and what is not. In corn, for example, there is no nutritional value other than carbohydrates and sugar, so I educate them to eat other healthy vegetables."
• • •
Waxman Bakshi's first video aired a decade ago.
Since then, it has garnered about half a million YouTube subscriptions, more than 100 million views and no less than 300,000 followers on Instagram.
"I googled how to clean my makeup brushes, and found a video of an American girl," she recalls the premiere video, "I followed her videos, but I searched for things in Hebrew and did not find any. I said, come on, I'll make one too. I did not tell anyone. "Not even for my husband. It was the most unplanned, and maybe that was the magic."
Have you been told that you are reminiscent of the Italian Chiara Franny, the most successful fashion blogger in the world today?
"A lot of people tell me that, and there really were times when she was a huge inspiration to me in the field. Today she is no longer a content maker, which is exactly why I need the change in my life. Sometimes Kiara brings up things that seem to have no power over them, and her marketing content is "The worst in the universe. It's already boring to me, and I'm afraid of falling into this place."
Following your success, many more have emerged who have tried their luck in the field.
"They grew, but also many disappeared and some moved to other genres. Moran Trasov started with makeup, and since she changed to family content she has broken out much more; or Keren Shaham, which is like makeup, but in a much more humorous way. I also squinted at other areas, a little family And fashion. "
By the way, there have been rumors that your relationship with model Bar Sommer, who released a makeup line, is not good.
"I do not know why people think that. We really turn around and correspond. I do not quarrel with anyone."
Playing with Ofer Schechter in a promotional video, Photo: From Instagram
As an authority in a field that is considered an economic bonanza, with rising demand and a revenue curve accordingly, Waxman Bakshi has earned quite a bit of money - from the amount of views, from commercial collaborations and from marketing content.
"I was able to make a very nice profit and I'm proud of it, but I invested almost everything I earned back in my brand, which sells makeup and related products. Do not forget that in the first years I did not earn a shekel on YouTube,
When did you actually start earning?
"Only after four years, and even then it was a few hundred dollars a month, on the views."
What have you made a living from in the meantime?
"At first I was also a makeup artist, and later I knocked on the doors of PR and advertising people and convinced them why they really should work with me. Today I live well. I lack nothing and I am grateful, but still my children have to hear 'no'. I do not buy either. I have everything I want. "
What did you want and not buy?
"I saw an expensive Balenciaga bag, and I have expensive bags, but I realized that it could be given up. Its price was NIS 6,000 after a 40 percent discount. I am a very practical person, and I did not pass this test."
What is the most valuable item in your closet?
"A Chanel bag that cost 5,000 euros. Some will think I'm crazy and stupid, but I like to invest in bags and shoes."
You do not like to talk about money.
"For years I refrained from talking about money, because in Israel I feel, unfortunately, that people like to hate those who make money. Even if they make money in the most legal, legitimate and hard way - they do not praise him. Abroad a person with money is admired because he is probably a cannon, But I felt that the more I succeeded, the more I was warned about it. "
Do you have an explanation for why?
"People feel that there is no place for everyone to succeed in our small country. There is a feeling here that the cake is too small to share, and that is not true. Precisely here, where everyone issues on the right and left, there is room for everyone. Our shekel is strong, our economy is amazing, we have wonderful hitchhikers, good universities - but still carry here the sense of the persecuted people, the kind of trauma we experience and have a hard time with. When I see a successful person, I do not envy him. On the contrary, I want to be close To him and I want to learn from him. "
On the other hand, anyone who has 100,000 followers is already launching a line.
"There's a problem, and it's not the network stars and the celebrities, but the factories - who are hurting their own industry. Everybody who is a little famous today receives a call from factories that tell her, 'Everything is ready, just stick your name.'
"I really think everyone deserves a livelihood, but the problem is the cheapness of the profession. When I created my brand, in 2015, I flew to Milan with my own formulas and did everything to bring value to my products. I say: stop copying and bring value with something a little different ".
One camera from her videos.
"Does not live in peace with the definition 'network star'", Photo: Eric Sultan
With a hand on the blush, how much can be renewed in makeup?
"I try very hard, and it's not easy. It's an industry of thousands of years, and I try what I can. If I fail to invent something new, I give up the product. When I release a product I want to give it value, otherwise they will go to 'Count' ( A chain of international French makeup brands;
How much makeup do you have at home?
"Full. I have a separate room, and I also throw away a lot because it spoils. I donate a lot and also buy full, even though I get a lot of products. Two days ago I bought things for NIS 800. Although I could pick up the phone and ask to have it sent to me - I preferred not to."
Lost money in Corona?
"The timing was really not good for me in terms of business, because I invested a lot of money in stock and launched lipstick at a time when everyone was wearing a mask. In short, I have not yet recouped all my investments."
Will the materials you photographed remain on YouTube or will you hide them?
"I leave everything."
And what about the farewell video? Have you photographed it yet?
"Not yet. I want it to be an invested video, maybe bring back Luke before he really worked, maybe host someone. I want to put some thought into it and say goodbye in style."
erans@israelhayom.co.il
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