Put On a Pretty Face
Last year at the spring fashion shows, designers showered the runways with frilly, flowing fashions and heavy doses of pinks, purples, oranges and blues. And the fresh, glowing look seen (for the most part) on models’ faces was inevitable, according to those in the know--four of L.A.’s top makeup artists.
Artist Jo Strettell, who created the understated look of model Niki Taylor in the current Liz Claiborne ad campaign and that of actress Heather Graham at this year’s Oscars, promises that this year it’s all about pretty. Not too weird. Not too natural. Not too difficult. “No more painted faces, no lines. It’s more like you throw a little on and you look healthy.”
Francesca Tolot, who did Faith Hill’s face for the Oscars and Sharon Stone’s in “If These Walls Could Talk II,” agrees that “there’s no drama in makeup this year.” Translated, that means the powdery, heavy earth-tones look of seasons past is gone. And fini is drop-dead glamour, a labor-intensive look that required layers of products and impossible skill. Ask any makeup artist worth her blush and she’ll throw around words like “dewy,” “happy,” “glowing” and “sun-kissed.”
“The brutal reality,” explains Strettell, who works with photographer Herb Ritts, “is that models and celebrities look fantastic when they jump out of the bath. Which doesn’t mean there aren’t products out there to help you get closer to that.” There are, especially now. Cheek stains, lip tints, bronzes, shimmers, pinks and peaches are “the essence of spring,” says Maital Sabban (whose clients include former Noxema girl Rebecca Gayheart).
Ironically, makeup artists don’t wear much makeup themselves. “When I’m working,” says Sharon Gault, who framed Selma Blair’s brown eyes in maroon lashes for the Oscars and who counts David LaChapelle and Ellen Von Unwerth among the photographers she works with, “it’s not about me. I’m giving a service.” Likewise, Tolot remarks with a smile, “I’ve been doing this too long.” With her own makeup, she aims for “natural with a glow. I try to look young and fresh, since I’m not.” Strettell’s routine on the rare occasion when she paints her own face includes, in addition to a light foundation and mascara, just one color blended with her fingertips on lips, cheeks and eyes. She makes it look so easy that one wonders if she’s even doing her job.
Sure, in fashion photography and on the runways, the experts may take creative license--painting the eyes purple, as it were. But, as the professionals insist, their goal is not to make a person up as much as it is to bring a person out. “I usually get a feeling from within when I’m looking at someone’s face,” says Gault, who’s known around town as Mama Makeup. “I work with them.”
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Styled by Charlie Altuna/Celestine, L.A.; hair: Alex Dizon/Artists by Timothy Priano; manicurist: Gina Viviano/Cloutier; wardrobe assistant: David Van De Veere; clothing: DKNY, Giorgio Armani, RALPH by Ralph Lauren, and Elisabetta Rogiani; Gault’s hair: Katja Fenchel, creative director/The New Vidal Sassoon, Beverly Hills; Gault’s hair colorist: Charmaine Piche, head colorist/The New Vidal Sassoon, Beverly Hills
