Supermodel Helena Christensen defends Kate Moss

STOCKHOLM - Danish supermodel Helena Christensen has leapt to the defence of Kate Moss, predicting that her modelling career will bounce back from allegations of cocaine abuse.

"Kate is going to come back, she is going to be super-strong again," Christensen said at the opening of an exhibition of her photography in the Swedish capital yesterday.

"Everybody is going to want her again because she is that kind of person. She is very professional and she's beautiful and she is someone who is going to be around forever."

Pictures of Moss allegedly snorting cocaine were published in the Daily Mirror in September, leading retailer Burberry and Swedish-based fashion house Hennes and Mauritz to sever ties with one of the most famous faces in fashion.

France's Chanel said it would not renew her contract.

Christensen criticised the tabloids for building up celebrities and then knocking them down.

"They are the ones I feel sorry for in the end," she said. "They have to live with themselves every day and realise what they are actually doing and how inhuman they can be."

The exhibition, which will travel to Paris and Berlin, shows 34 pictures taken by Christensen with a mobile phone camera.

The model, who is as comfortable behind the lens as she is in front of it, began taking photos as a hobby while travelling round the world in her late teens. She now works regularly as a photographer for fashion magazines such as Elle and Vogue.

"One of the reasons I actually got into modelling was because I thought it would be a great way of being flown around the world to do my photography," she said. "It took me 15 years to get back to it."

- REUTERS