DIRECT TALK(VISION VIBES)

Draft transcript

Chloe Potter / Host:

I'm Chloe Potter, and this is VISION VIBES, the podcast bringing you the uplifting stories of inspiring people from all walks of life.

The first time I experienced onsen in Japan transformed how I saw my body. Growing up in the UK, I'd not really seen anyone naked other than my immediate family. And going into an onsen age 25, I understood something for the first time: Every human being is beautiful. And our bodies are as unique as our faces. No one has the body that we're shown in adverts and magazines. The body we're all told to aspire to have, it doesn't exist. It's the result of airbrushing and lighting and a whole team of highly paid, highly skilled professionals working hard to get that one shot, where everything seems in proportion and smooth and unblemished.

The shame around having a body that does not conform to society's exacting beauty standards persists, and it can be toxic. Today's interviewee is creative director and fashion stylist, Marcus John. When he discovered how much shame there is around the spinal condition, scoliosis, he decided he had to act to empower people with the condition, to help them to celebrate their uniqueness instead of hiding their difference.

Marcus John:

A few close friends of mine actually are impacted by scoliosis, and with myself being a creative director as well as a wardrobe stylist in the fashion industry, I just felt that uh, it was best for me to use my skill sets to help support them in regard to what they go through mentally, physically and whatnot. To create awareness and things of that nature. So, "How can I make her happy? How can I empower her? How can I make her feel beautiful? How can I?" So, just asking these types of questions. And that's when I just basically created a concept in the beginning of a beauty and empowerment campaign for anyone that is affected by scoliosis.

So, scoliosis is actually the most common spinal condition out of all these spinal conditions. And also it's essentially it is a sideways curvature of the spine that measures greater than ten degrees to the left, or to the right, facing the examiner.

And also to what it's a really big on a person's mental health as 40％ of individuals affected by this condition actually suffer from suicidal thoughts.

And it's also considered a hidden condition because many people actually hide it through loose clothing, through, with females, this is growing their hair out intentionally so they can hide the curvature of the back or the scar of it they had surgery.

So, my background is in fashion as a creative director and wardrobe stylist. My work has been on the cover of Harper's Bazaar, Editorial, Vogue and GQ, Esquire and a close friend of mine, she really just loves my work in the way that I style individuals. And she was attending her first gala, which was also a huge gala which was "VH1 Save the Music," and she asked me to style her for it.

I just had her come to the set of my photoshoot so we could get fitted for her. And when she came, she'd seen the clothing rack from a distance, and she was just extremely excited about it. And, as she gets closer to the rack, she looks basically at the dress from the bottom up and she's like feeling the materials, she's just touching it and really loving it. But then when she gets to the top of the dress, she sees that it's like shoulder-less. And she's like, "Okay, I really love this one." And all of a sudden it was, "Let's see the next one." So, then she gets to the next one, starts from the bottom up again, starts feeling the materials sees the length of it, and now she sees that it has a Deep V in the back and she's just like," Oh, I really love this one as well, but let's just get to the next one." And then the next one she sees that that has a high neck, but then its backless. So, she's on to the next one. She was just like overwhelmed, I believed, at the time. And she, then said, "Hey, Marcus," like, "You mind if I speak to you in the back." And I was like, "Yeah," like, "No problem at all." But in my head, also at the same time, it's like, "Did I say something wrong?" or "Did I say something offensive?" I was just a little confused.

So, I started walking to the back and I like, you know, she said "Hey, Marcus, like, you know, I'm one of your biggest fans. That's the only reason ... also one of the reasons why I asked you to style me for the gala." And she was like, "You know, but?" and as she says the word, "but" a teardrop just falls from her eye. And I, now, instantly started thinking again, like, "I must have said something wrong." And she says, "You know, but I suffer from scoliosis." And, also at the time, for myself, I was unaware of how scoliosis impacted the human body. So, then I told her, I was like, "Listen, I don't mean to sound ignorant in any kind of way, but I'm just not sure how that affects the human body, what it looks like, or anything." So, she then shows me her spine, and it's literally like an "S." When, a...um, someone who doesn't have scoliosis their spin is supposed to be more so straight up. And uh.. when I'd seen it though, I more so viewed it, I more so viewed it as a beautiful uniqueness versus like a deformity or things like that. And from there I just more so wanted to create an empowerment campaign for anyone that was dealing with anything alike.

Chloe Potter / Host:

In 2016, Marcus John set up a charity called "Back to Healing." It began with a photography exhibition at New York Fashion Week. It showcased stylish, beautiful photos of people with scoliosis. The idea was to celebrate these different bodies to replace shame with pride.

Marcus went on to take the exhibition on tour around America raising money as he went. He later partnered with surgeons and suppliers of implants, offering free surgeries for children who could never afford it without help.

Marcus John:

So, it's "Back to Healing Incorporated" as the full name. Play along the words of mental health as well as scoliosis. So, essentially our mission is to improve the quality of life of individuals affected by scoliosis, through mental health awareness, education, empowerment, and advocacy. And I just honestly just want to give a voice to individuals impacted by this condition.

That was my first ever exhibition, and I collectively was able to garner a lot of support from very incredible individuals having scoliosis. All of them have very inspiring stories. Once again, I'm really big on diversity, and so I wanted to show different ages, different races, different genders. Some who were surgically treated, some who were nonsurgical, and it was just an incredible night.

So, one of their metrics of success was if we can get at least 50 people to attend the opening night party to this, that would be incredible. That first night, we had over 410 people.

And an incredible thing as well for me at least, we don't show the participants their photos, so they just come say a month or two prior, get the photographs taken. And then from there they don't see the images again until the opening night when they attend. And the opening night event they attend with their loved ones, their families, their spouses, whatever. And I just remember seeing just the participants seeing their photos for the first time. Many of them were crying, just due to an overwhelming emotion of just happiness or proudness or just feeling like they're, like they're seen, like they're heard. Um..because once again, they don't really speak about this condition. Even if someone asks them about it, sometimes they deny it, or once again, wear their hair, or just loose clothing. So, no one knows.

But this time was more so like, this is me, this is who I am, this is my story. And I'm ready to come out to the world to show individuals who are affected, or individuals who also may be affected by this condition and in hopes to inspire them, in hopes to motivate them, to share their stories as well. It was an absolutely incredible night. And from that night alone, I saw that this is something that I continue, I want to continue doing.

Where if you, if anyone's familiar with Stryker, which is one of the biggest medical device companies. If you ever go to their headquarters in the U.S., at least, which is in Virginia, our artwork decorates their entire auditorium. We also sell our artwork themselves, photographs and other means are through partnerships and sponsors. So, they, you know, do donations to us as well.

Um...so, there are different ways that we can definitely get crafty, and that we definitely raise funds. But I would say, you know so that ones that we have annually is definitely our exhibitions that we do, and our newly incorporated ones are our mission trips. So, one is a lot for mental health and representation, which is our exhibitions. Another one is really just providing children free surgeries from all around the world, living in impoverished areas who could never afford it on their own. Those are very special to me because when we have a mission trip, whatnot, they're able to provide us with the implants as well as the equipment for our team of surgeons to actually travel to these countries. So, the surgeons that we work with, they donate their time, and we fly out to... the first one was actually in Brazil under our Back to Healing umbrella that was last November. And we partnered with an incredible hospital over there, Medtronic as well as Stryker. And basically, they donated implants to us. And these implants were, they equate to almost, not even almost, they equate to over $2.5 million in, in kind donations and once again, we're able to provide free surgeries to these children who can never afford it.

Chloe Potter / Host:

Marcus's work grew from a small seed wanting to help a friend to feel better about their body. Many of us might feel empathy for a friend facing a challenging situation, but Marcus went further and set out to change things. He put one foot in front of the next, nurturing the project, allowing it to grow. And now he's helping many people feel better.

Marcus told us that he lives by the maxim: If you believe you will achieve, and it certainly seems to have kept him going.

We still have a very long way to go to dismantle our unhealthy and narrow ideas of beauty, but thanks to people like Marcus, it does feel like things are beginning to change. That's it for this episode. If you enjoyed this one, you might be interested to listen to the episode with Naomi Shimada, a model-turned-body positive campaigner.

You can find out more about all the VISION VIBES episodes on the NHK WORLD-JAPAN website. I'm Chloe Potter. Please join us next time to hear more from inspiring people around the world on VISION VIBES.