Black Model Adut Akech Calls Out Australian Magazine For Carelessly Publishing The Wrong Image

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South Sudanese-Australian model Adut Akech called out Australian Magazine for carelessly using another model picture for her interview with the print Magazine. Adut Akach is one of the most well known black models in the world, how could they get her picture wrong?

WHO Magazine, Australia over the week did a feature on the model ahead of Melbourne Fashion Week. In the magazine interview, she discussed people’s attitudes to colour and her career in fashion. But the magazine, however, printed an image of Flavia Lazarus, another model appearing at the show, instead of Adut Akach. 

These two models, as you can see above, looks different and nothing in common. Flavia Lazarus is very much lighter than Adut, to name a few features.

Adut Akach took to her Instagram page to voice her anger about the unprofessionalism and carelessness, she said: “This is a big deal because of what I spoke about in my interview. By this happening, I felt it defeated the purpose of what I stand for and spoke about.”

She added that she wanted the incident to be a “wake-up call to people within the industry”.

The magazine has since then apologised and blamed the error on technical issues.

“Both Adut and Flavia have expressed their disappointment and said the error is unacceptable. Fans backed them up with some fellow black models hinting such error has also happened to them at some point. They agree with Adut’s rant and cheered her for calling the magazine out.

They all hope this will lead to a good example and for Magazines to take time and know their black models better before publication.

View this post on Instagram

I’ve have given some deep thoughts the past few days on how to approach this situation that isn’t sitting well with me.  For those who are not aware, last week @whomagazine (Australia) published a feature article about me. In the interview I spoke about how people view refugees and peoples attitude to colour in general. With the article they published a large photo saying it was me. But it was of another black girl. This has upset me, has made me angry, it has made me feel very disrespected and to me is unacceptable and inexcusable under any circumstances. Not only do I personally feel insulted and disrespected but I feel like my entire race has been disrespected too and it is why I feel it is important that I address this issue. Whoever did this clearly the thought that was me in that picture and that’s not okay. This  is a big deal because of what I spoke about in my interview. By this happening I feel like it defeated the purpose of what I stand for and spoke about. It goes to show that people are very ignorant and narrowminded that they think every black girl or African people looks the same. I feel as though this would’ve not happened to a white model. My aim for this post is not to bash Who Magazine -they have apologised to me directly – but I feel like I need to express publicly how I feel. This has deeply affected me and we need to start an important conversation that needs to happen. I’m sure that I’m not the first person that’s experienced this and it needs to stop. I’ve been called by the name of another models who happens to be of the same Ethnicity, I find it very ignorant, rude and disrespectful towards both of us simply because we know that this doesn’t happen with white models. I want this to be somewhat of a wake up call to people within the industry it’s not OK and you need to do better. Big publications need to make sure that they fact check things before publishing them especially when its real stories and interviews and not just some made up rumors. To those who work at shows and shoots it’s important that you don’t mix up models names. Australia you’ve a lot of work to do and you’ve got to do better and that goes to the rest of the industry

A post shared by Adut Akech Bior (@adutakech) on Aug 25, 2019 at 5:34am PDT