article, the statue’s name was given as “Diana,” not “Diane.” I sent an email correcting this and one thing led to another.


Q: How did you get into modeling?


I became a model because everyone told me I should. In 1975, I was tall, thin, and not bad looking. I went to modeling school in Southfield and don’t recommend it to anybody. It was a total waste of money and I didn’t get one job out of it. If you have the stuff, move to New York, which I should have done. Around 1980, I had a boyfriend who pushed me into modeling. It was a Bo Derek/Svengali type of thing. I still remember driving to my first session. I ran a red


light and was almost broad-sided by another car. I arrived ten minutes late to a life drawing class in some old draſty building at EMU. I changed into a Japanese robe and slippers I had just bought, went back into the room, and then stood there naked and posing like a dope. I had no clue what to do. Te students didn’t find this unusual, but young men in the hallway kept looking through the window and jeering. I was terrified, sure I’d be fired, and I was only making $7.00 an hour. It was the longest hour and a half of my life. But the professor said I did a good job and asked me to come back the next week wearing something colorful for a watercolor class. I got to wear clothes for that one, but they paid me less. It got easier with experience.


Q: What other modeling did you do?


For a while, I worked as a medical model for physicians in training. For that job, I lay on a table in a green string bikini and got poked and touched all day long. I made something outrageous, like $300 a day, for lying on my back. One time, I got paid $80 to have students put a fake cast on my arm. I was also one of those annoying models pushing men’s cologne samples at swanky department stores like Jacobson’s, Lord and Taylor’s and Hudson’s. Tat was no fun. But I also posed for sculptures, drawings and paintings,


and for artsy photographs. During my almost two-year nude modeling career, I worked at EMU, Washtenaw Community College, and U-M for artists including Jon Lockard (who taught me a lot), Chris Lauckner, Tim Wade, Norma Penchansky, Ron Mathis, Nick Pappas, Darryl Miller and a host of others. Te 1981 Ann Arbor Street Art Fair was surreal: I literally saw my face and rear plastered everywhere.


Q: What was it like posing for “Diane”? You have to love the smell of wet clay in the morning. I was


Photo on the opposite page of the real Diane with sculpter Darryl Miller’s famous statue superimposed in the background.


in demand as a model at EMU, and sculpture professor Nick Pappas secured me for a couple of months. I remember meeting Darryl Miller, the artist who created the statue, to discuss his ideas for a full-body sculpture. It was very cold and just another gig at the time. We started in January or February and finished in April, with me posing for two or three hours, two or three times a week. Initially I had no idea the sculpture would be bronzed and put on display. Once we were done, I took a trip to Florida and prety much forgot about the whole thing.


Q: What do you remember about the famous first kidnapping of “Diane”?


Te first time was in April 1985, a few weeks aſter my son was born. I was reading the Ann Arbor News and came across the article. Talk about flipping out! Apparently some people really get carried away with sports. Te kidnapping had to do with a basketball coach’s questionable performance. Te three-page ransom note, writen from Diane’s perspective, stated that if coaching changes were not made the statue would become 200 bronze ashtrays. “Diane” was later found unharmed, and kidnapped again in 1994, I believe.


Q: Have you heard about the tradition of puting clothes on the statue?


I’ve heard the kidnappers would dress her up in caps and sunglasses and EMU students wrap her in scarves and knited hats during fall and winter to keep her warm. For me, it’s an eerie coincidence. I hate being cold, and am almost never without my Detroit Tigers cap, hoodie, sunglasses, and leopard scarf from November to April. Michigan, right?


Q: What are you up to now?


At 53 years old, I’m back in the Detroit area where I started from. I take care of my elderly home-bound mother and other family members five days a week. Weather and time permiting, I enjoy studying large insects and their behavioral paterns in southeast Michigan. And I spend quality time with my fiancé and three cats.


Q. Have you kept your connection to the sculpture a secret?


Although I’m not embarrassed or ashamed in the least, yes, I have. Only a handful of people know that I was the model for “Diane.” I took a fine arts class in Ford Hall back in the early ’90s, and walked by that statue every week. I chuckled to myself that no one had a clue that it’s me. Now, I suspect, a few more people will figure it out. But that’s okay. Just don’t tell my mom! 3


Eastern | WINTER 2012 23


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