Rick Owens Punched The Model Who Protested On His Runway


Rick Owens doesn’t really seem like an overly angry or violent dude; he usually seems really chill, hanging in his tonal drapery and giant sneakers.
But Owens was absolutely fucking livid after one of his models held an impromptu political protest about the Chancellor of Germany on his Paris Menswear Fashion Week runway. 
The model, Jera Diarc, held up a cloth sign with the words ‘KILL ANGELA MERKEL. NOT’ scrawled in black texta.
Patrick Kovarik/AFP/Getty Images
The designer spoke to media after the show, saying that it definitely was not part of the show:

“It’s a crazy, rogue, fucking model that I punched when he came back out.”


“He’s been my male muse for the past 12 years or something and I think he just felt comfortable enough to do something in a show and I’m furious. The irony is that the collection (titled Cyclops) is about male aggression and protesting.”

Owens’ representatives were quick to give an official statement which didn’t involve physical violence or expletives, saying, “This was an independent statement and does not reflect the opinion of the house of Rick Owens.”
According to The Daily Beast, Diarc’s agency, ‘Tomorrow is Another Day’ has dropped the model from their books, cutting his contract and sending him home to Germany. Agency boss Eva Godel said that the model was generally very unpredictable:

“I never want to see him again,” she said.

“He was always late, never on time, I always knew he was crazy. Rick was the only one who would book him. Rick was supportive of him, even if he was always late. There is no way I ever expected him to do anything so stupid. I am surprised and angry. It was so disrespectful to Rick, and the team who worked on the clothes and show. I was shocked and Rick was furious.”


“Maybe Jera was drunk. It wasn’t an intelligent statement. It was idiotic. I have no idea. I don’t understand. It is so sad this is what people are talking about, when they should be talking about Rick’s show.”

Well, we don’t know how Rick Owens actually managed to top his last show, which featured roughly-cut tunics with literal NSFW dickholes, but somehow he has. 
Image: Thierry Chesnot via Getty

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