The Fall Fashion Issue may contain Kehlani's first-ever cover feature, but it was a milestone for that story's photographer, Joyce Kim, too. A longtime freelancer, Kim explains what it meant to shoot her first cover of The FADER, and why she was especially stoked on her subject.
JOYCE KIM: We started the shoot at Kehlani's apartment, where she was just getting ready and hanging out with her friends and her manager. I usually try to shoot the subject in their own space, where they feel comfortable. I was hoping that she was cool to work with, and fortunately she was. A lot of people aren’t good at being photographed, but Kehlani has a great body awareness, which is rare.
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At one point, Kehlani and her girlfriends were standing around talking about social media. Kehlani downloaded Periscope and was caught off-guard because she immediately had, like, a million followers. She’s blowing up crazily, but it was still a funny moment withher and her girlfriends being like, “What is going on!”
Once [FADER Photo Director] Geordie Wood and I set the date for the cover shoot, I realized it had been exactly two years since my first assignment for The FADER, almost to the day. I was like, Holy shit, that is so crazy. Shooting the cover means that I’m in such amazing company: Jason Nocito, Daniel Shea—it’s pretty amazing. It’s a good milestone to show how my relationship with The FADER has grown
It felt great being a female and shooting a female for the cover. Working with rappers a lot, I realized I had almost exclusively been shooting men. It's not like I have this crazy agenda of trying to put more ladies in the mix, but I definitely notice when it happens. I'm like, Fuck—that’s cool.
Pre-order a copy of Kehlani's issue of The FADER now. It hits newsstands August 25.
