ADVERTISEMENT
When you're the illustrator for magazines likeVogue, Elle, and Harper's Bazaar — and it's the '70s — you'd better have a way to capture the chaos and glamour that's happening around you. That's exactly what Antonio Lopez did as he jetted across the fashion map with the industry's wildest and most talented elite. And thankfully, we've got his book Instamatics to relive it all. Think: Grace Coddington, Jerry Hall, Karl Lagerfeld, and more, caught in the middle of life's most mundane, intimate moments.
Ironically, the images are what you'd typically find on throwback Instagram accounts today. Only, Lopez wouldn't call himself a photographer. In an interview with Michael McKenzie in 1978, he explained why he used the camera he did: "[It's] the perfect camera for the simple person like me. I guess I could get smart, learn how to use a Nikon and all the fancy equipment, but that would be like saying, 'Hey, I'm a photographer now,' and that would be pretentious of me."
Either way, we imagine this is what Instagram would have looked like some 40 years ago. Despite Lopez's death in 1987, his photographs live on, as well as most of his subjects, too. Ahead, you'll find just a preview of his book, that even itself is a sample of the "hundreds, thousands of shots" he captured. A magnet for beauty in all shapes and sizes, Lopez and his photographs remind us that, at its core, the fashion industry was and always will be a place for anyone: those rejects, mavericks, and rebels alike.
ADVERTISEMENT