ANINDITA SARYUF
Anindita Saryuf is ELLE Indonesia Fashion Editor, Stylist & also Santamonica's Vocalist. She's from Jakarta.
ANINDITA SARYUF: “In my opinion, image is never real.”
[interview.aldy kusumah / pics.luki ali of lukimages / December 2011]
Santamonica's second album. When will it hit record store shelves?
Maybe next year. I don't know. We've been really busy with our full time work, and also other projects. Up till now, we've recorded 5 songs. I'm sorry to disappoint our fans, but we're not really inspired to record any new song now. Hopefully soon. I might need to take a break from work to really focus on this second album though.
Do you still do illustrations nowadays?
No. I haven't got much free time as my work requires me to travel quite a lot. I still draw though, when making storyboards and concepts for photo shoots.. And sometimes doodling random stuffs. Mostly shoes, girls eyes, lips, and bosoms, during meeting. Maybe when I'm retired from this job, I will consider to do it again.
What about your involvement with Sinjitos records as a creative director & stylist?
It's a natural process as Iyub (Santamonica) owns Sinjitos. Mostly it's for band's photo shoot or for music video. Well, sometimes he'd ask me (when wanting to sign new band or artist) if I could help to make them look stylish. Believe me, there are some people who couldn't be helped, style wise. I would give my opinion to him, or what are the things that we can do to make the band look better. Obviously, as a record label, business wise, you would want to sign someone who has the whole package, right? Or someone who has the potential.
You also does image directions for Sinjitos bands. Can you elaborate?
Well, we're not like those Korean pop industry or the mainstream records label who totally change the appearance and creating generic look for the bands. I just help the bands/artists to find certain image that they would love to project onstage or to their fans. Entertainment is still entertainment, people want to look good when performing and their fans want to see their idols to look cool or inspiring. It doesn't have to look super polished, or dandy or wearing the latest trend, I think it would be too overdone for bands, they still have to have their personality. My job is to 'polish' it. For example Bayu Risa, when he started with us, he knew that he wanted to dress up nicely but had no clue how to. Eventually, some straight men are like that. So I drew out a concept for him, as his music roots are R&B, hip hop, soul, with touch of electro, I thought of dressing him with something sleek like blazer but adding a bit of twist; and paired it with drop crotch pants (not too MC Hammer-y tho') and hi-top sneakers (because he's a street baller, and also to make him still look fun, and still can dance onstage). He liked the idea of having a "dressy" stuff mixed with some street touch for his onstage look, so there goes.
Some bands needed the image directions, some can appear effortlessly cool without help. How far does image directions with bands go?
Some musicians or some people were born lucky, they had the whole package: Good looks, great sense of style, and even greater talents. In my opinion, looking effortlessly cool without throwing much efforts are bullshit. Of course as I said before, some people already got good sense of style, I call it great instinct. But looking cool, has many factors behind it. One is trial and error. Those people, learnt from their fashion mistakes in the past, that some stuffs just don't look good on them, so they know what does look good on them. They also have good references, from magazines, movies, music, etc. Other than that, they got help from stylist. People tend to underestimate stylist job. A good stylist is not just putting clothes on people, they actually have to have a good understanding on composition, fashion history, semiotic and also to have a good instinct. Like in Korean Pop industry, the whole generic images they created are not as simple as "let's dress them in cute schoolgirl skirt." Everything was well thought of, even what you see as 'norak' was meant to create that effect on people. Anyway, with bands, depends on what kind of bands you're working with, and their music direction too. With me, personally I don't really like to totally change someone's look. I think, we should still see their personality. Like my answer on previous question, I just help to polish them up or showing them wider options and how far they can explore it. I will not force them to agree with me completely, but at least to try it first and if they're not comfortable with it, we will find other solution.
Besides sounding great, I agree that bands should be a visual eye candy too. But if a band get too much help from a stylist, don't you think that their image is not honest and a bit "fake"?
In my opinion, image is never real, but how well you can make people to believe that you're not "fake". Since ancient time, people use clothes to project certain image that they want people to think of them to be. Good stylist is one who understands what their client want, and how to make them look better without 100 percent changing their personality. Fake, I don't think is the right word. Because after all in this industry, we have a better word, which is illusion. Fake, is for a bad or worse, mediocre styling.
You also works at ELLE Indonesia as a fashion editor & stylist. Can you tell us a bit on the process of making a great fashion spread from concept to layout?
I work as Senior Fashion Editor for ELLE. My job desc includes styling (fashion editorial, profile shoots), editing (from articles to selecting photos), creating editorial contents such as trends, fashion feature, style ideas and advertorials. For fashion magazines like ELLE, fashion spreads or we call it fashion well in ELLE, are one of the most crucial feature in every issue. It's like the DNA of our magazine, thus great efforts always put into the spreads. For each spread, I will discuss it first with my Editor in Chief, about my ideas, and how it relates to the issue's main theme. Sometimes it's totally different from the theme, depends on the trend or season. I can get ideas from anything; books, film, music, words, trends. When she's given her approval, I will soon contact the photographer whom I thought would be suitable for the editorial. I choose the photographer based on their style, and their competence. Some are good doing epic stuff with epic props, some are good with natural light, some are good for studio lighting, etc etc. Then we will arrange a meeting, discuss about the ideas, I'm always open to opinion and ideas from photographers, after all it's not a work of mine only. Then I will draw each frame on storyboard, as a guidance for layout, because you need to have a dynamic layout for every page. At least we would know which frame that will be shot in medium length, or which one is full, or which is close up. After that I will contact all the PRs from brands to ask them to loan me the press racks (runway samples that provided for photo shoot). If no samples are available, then I will need to borrow from stores. Next step is to choose for models, which is also crucial, because I have to know which girl will be suitable for this specific shoot. A girl next-door? or alien look? My assistant would help me book the girls and hair and makeup artist, borrow the clothes (usually I will go with them to borrow stuff, but with samples I just need to tell them which look that I want to use). We will organize the food, the contracts, the location (some photographers helped us to scout the location, ask for permission, etc), and all the works. Before shooting day, I would do some see through over the clothes that we will use the next day. Doing mix and match, and take pic of each look so I can remember it, and my assistant can take note on which clothes/brand we use for credits. On the photo shoot day, usually we will come early, arrange all the clothes, shoes, etc. Then supervising the makeup process. When everything's ready, we would start the shoot, I would be explaining to the model about the whole story of the shoot, so she can get the mood, and whether she needs to act or just moving around. With each model, there's different way of directing them, sometimes a pro knows how to move in front of camera without us have to direct her every move. But some girls who are plainly clueless needs to be instructed in a very specific way, but sometimes with me, I just let them move around, and wait for the in between pose, or just shoot candidly, usually it works the best. After we're done, I would be selecting 5-6 pic for each frame, and then my EiC will choose the final pics. Selected pics will then get retouched, and proof printed. I will then discuss it with the art dept., on the layouts, page order and the best photos will be placed as opener and on the last page. The final decision, of course, will be my EiC's.
Tell us a bit on your directorial debut with Roman Foot Soldiers video clip?
Maybe it's just some personal ambition for me, but I always wanted to create a short film. I like beautiful photos and films, but I don't have the talent to work with the lens. I'm good with concept, creating visual direction, layouts, and directing people, so I thought why not directing a clip. In my mind, it would be quite similar with producing a fashion editorials. Well, similar but also very different. With editorials you only work on 10-20 frames of pictures to create a story, and all are motionless. While with clips, there are like millions of frames just to create 3 mins clip. But I'm a stubborn girl, although I don't have any experience with it before I thought why not giving it a try. When I heard Roman Foot Soldiers' debut single, Waterfront, I fell in love with the song instantly. Not only it's a nice song, but the music is quite easy to be translated into visuals. So I started my research, trying to figure out the most suitable visual for the song. I came across several fashion videos, with those pretty young boys running around, being silly but cute. I thought it's what I want, just having those Roman kids jumping, running, being silly, but cute. As I always love black and white (film and photos), I wanted to do this clip in black and white, and to make it look like those fashion ad videos. Me and Iyub then asked Nicoline Patricia Malina, a photographer friend of us if she'd be interested in co-directing the video with me. We're lucky, as Nicoline is one of the best fashion photographer in Indonesia, and she's good in translating sexiness in pictures. She's not only co-directed it with me, she's also the director of photography for the clip. We then worked on the concept, and I also did the styling for the boys. It's a new experience, very exhausting, especially during the editing, as I had to run through all the footages, millions of frames and checked it one by one in order to edit them. But in the end, really worth it.
Any other projects that we should know of in the future?
Many... But can't really say it now. Some have to remain off the record, for some work related matter. But you can see it when it's published. If you saw something good on print and thought "Whoaa, never know this thing had changed its image, it looks cool now".. Then it might be one of my work. :)
