IS this RACIST? Sometimes its not a simple Black or White.

So the cyber and fashion worlds are all atwitter so to speak. Getting in deep and deeper into the color divide debate. French Vogue editor, Carine Rotfield, has come under fire for recently publishing a photo spread of model Lara Stone painted black to match some of the clothing she is wearing. Lara Stone is white and while the photos are beautifully shot they also have a distinctly heated sexuality. There have been calls for the firing of the editor, a very vocal french cri de coeur, don't you think , of "off with her head" from newspapers and irate bloggers all over the world. People angrily insisting that the photo spread is racist and inflammatory and wrong. Insisting that this is another example of blackface buffoonery or mocking minstrels, a big photo spread N word that wraps itself in the guise of high fashion and art.

I think the Stephen Klein photo shoot for French Vogue is beautiful.

France is a country where African American expatriate Josephine Baker was treated like a Queen and revered as a Goddess. She was a French cultural icon of beauty, eventually becoming a French citizen, when back home in the U.S. she was still expected to ride in the back of a bus. France is where vocalist African American Nina Simone is revered as one of the greatest singers the world has ever known and where she died at age 70. France doesn't have the same recent weighted history of clashing color, of civil rights and race riots, as the US does. A nation where palpable tension simmers like a glass of angry OJ left boiling on the stove.

The image of the painted black hand holding the giant 65 carat marquise diamond is from a Vogue photo shoot by David Bailey from 1970. It was the idea of then editor Diana Vreeland who had the rock for two days to shoot. She had the gorgeous arm of a model who had the best arm in Paris, says Vreeland to model it. The model was white, a beautiful Swedish girl. The photo wasn't working. Vreeland thought it looked "too boring, too terrible - too tacky." She was on a deadline and frantic- the clock is ticking and nothing was working. She needed a shot that did the diamond justice. She went for a walk and she thought of precious stones and how they always were found in countries of people of color, who looked so beautiful wearing them on or against their varying shades of dusky skin. Her idea was to shoot the diamond not on a black hand but the white hand painted completely and artificially black. Painted with black shoe polish. She says in her book ALLURE that the reason the shot worked was it's absolute artifice. On a natural black hand , however beautiful, she says she would have just found it banal. Is this photo racist? Was Diana Vreeland the 1970's fashionista equivalent of wearing white sheets and burning crosses?

I think the image created by Vreeland and Bailey is beautiful.

The final images are ones taken from my own collaborative creative with photographer Margaret Malandrucolo many moons ago. It was one of those photo shoots where everything seems as if its falling apart at the last minute - the original model, a pretty white girl named Joanie, canceled at the last minute and our concept went out the window - the new 'model' we got was a club kid Margaret met the night before, who she thought had a great face, who's name escapes me.The idea came from me looking at the clothing the stylist brought. The origami paper shapes and hard angles of the clothes was my inspiration for hair and makeup. I had the idea of turning her into a half finished mannequin, whiting out all the skin on her hands and her facial features, letting color only come through where she came to life. Does making an asian girl look 'white' make me racist? I don't even remember contemplating the idea of cultural or ethnic sensitivity- I remember I just wanted to make amazing pictures.

I think the images* we created that day were beautiful.

I think the danger of becoming so politically correct and overtly sensitive to everyones issues and points of view is it becomes paralyzing. I think art, creativity and beauty should make us question ideas and the acceptance of the status quo. The way we see things like color and race and gender and sexuality need to be challenged for us to grow as people. Maybe the viewer's who see these images and cry racism and blackface have a bias they need to change. I see beautiful pictures. You? What do you see?

To see the entire sequence go to www,jodydaye.com under women's fashion