Sarah Vonderhaar, the musician, photographer and model who competed on Cycle 8 of America’s Next Top Model, has been focusing exclusively on music the past few years. She’s been working and playing steadily and released her first full length album, titled “Are You Listening Now” in April 2008.

Sarah sat down with the Daily Northwestern to briefly chat about her music career. She’s got a bizarre side gig, the drawbacks of being a reality-tv-star-turn-musician, her latest work and more. As for what ANTM has done for her career, it has both positive points and negative ones?

The publicity is great. But on a negative standpoint, I have to work even harder as a songwriter to prove myself because a lot people think, “Oh, she was on ‘Top Model,’ she’s doing music now, yeah right.” Then they listen to my record and come see me live, and they realize this is for real.

The interview is quite brief, but it’s nice to catch up with former ANTM contestants! Read the whole interview here.

All of Sarah’s singles are available to download through Amazon for $0.89 each!

Image: Amazon

The recent events surrounding Chris Brown and Rihanna have brought the issue of domestic violence and domestic abuse to the foreground once again, and shows that such abuse has no limits on age, race or economic standing. America’s Next Top Model Cycle 8 winner Jaslene Gonzalez is a survivor of domestic abuse and is currently a spokesperson for Liz Claiborne’s Love is Not Abuse organization.

Jaslene sat down with The Insider to chat about her encounters with domestic violence, her work with Liz Claiborne and more.

Jaslene is very open and vocal about her past because she thinks it’s especially important for teens and young girls to understand the issues surrounding domestic abuse and to know that such actions are never okay.

“I thought I was going to die,” Jaslene says as she recalls one incident. “I really lost my breath — I was trying to hard to get him off of me. But then it just came to the point where he let me go.”

You can watch the video interview here. It’s about four minutes long. She also offers Rihanna support and advice and hopes Rihanna can emerge from this experience a braver and stronger person.

I think it’s great that Jaslene is so passionate about this organization and so involved in it. Domestic violence is a really important issue that isn’t talked about enough.

Image: Splash News Online

Jaslene Gonzalez, winner of Cycle 8 of America’s Next Top Model, attended the Spanx Fashion Week Fall Preview at the Bryan Bark Hotel yesterday. It was one of a handful events that Jaslene took in over the course of fashion week.

Jaslene went for an NYC fashion staple outfit, wearing head-to-toe black.

Jaslene was also seen at Matt Levine’s 27th Birthday Party, wearing a bronze jumper, at the Domenico Vacca Fashion Show., at he LuxuryFashion.com “Faces of Fashion” party and more.

She also walked in the Jordi Scott show. She’s been one of the more prominent ANTMers this week, although a few others have had more work than she has.

Former America’s Next Top Model winners Caridee English (Cycle 7) and Jaslene Gonzalez (Cycle were two of the many stars who came out to the Victoria’s Secret “What Is Sexy?” celebration at the Bowery Hotel in NYC last night.

The “What is Sexy” celebration listed the sexiest celebrities, body parts, style, television shows and more from 2009. This is the fourth year for the list and this year’s theme was “the return to romance”, which honored the new Vintage Victoria line of lingerie. The list paid tribute to stars’ lasting appeal and timeless beauty. Victoria Angels Adriana Lima and Doutzen Kroes hosted the event, which saw celebs like The City star Erin Lucas, Bridgette Nielsen, Brandon Davis, and Robert Buckley come out for the night.

Winners included Angelina Jolie for “Sexiest Lips Present”, Tiny Fey for “Sexiest Funny Girl Present”, Gossip Girl for “Sexiest TV Cast Present”, Frank Sinatra for “Sexiest Eyes Past” and more. You can see a complete list of winners here.

Caridee showed off a sassy new haircut. I think it makes her look younger and is much fresher than her long hair, but she needs to lay off the tanning bed. The outfit could be cute, but it just seems off.

Image: Splash News Online

Jaslene hits another red carpet home run with an understated shirtdress and minimal accesories and make-up. She’s amped up the red carpet game, which is nice to see. So many of her past outfits were complete misses.

Image: Splash News Online

Who do you think rocked the red carpet better? Or did both girls come out looking like winners?

Jaslene Gonzalez makes an appearance in a Ryan Leslie video. This is his alternate video for the song “Addiction.” Jaslene plays Ryan’s girlfriend in the video, but he’s addicted to girls and girls are addicted to him, and the end result is disastrous.

“This video represents a different and just as important side of me: the imaginative, cinematic side,” Ryan writes on his YouTube account. In the end, he was really pleased with both videos. He really wanted to work with a strong female director and “under-exposed talent in the modeling world” for this video.

I’m not allowed to embed the video, but you can see it here.

I think Jaslene looks great in this video, what about you?

Dani Evans, winner of Cycle 6, Jaslene Gonzalez winner of Cycle 8, Saleisha Stowers, winner of Cycle 9 and Whitney Thompson, winner of Cycle 10 are modeling for MetroStyle.

Whitney makes an appearance in their Misses section, first, modeling a double-breasted silver blazer that’s $59.99.

It’s also available in bronze, but Whitney wasn’t put in that jacket. I guess the silver was more her color?

I’m glad her roots are touched up in this photo.

Is it just me or is that jacket way too old for Whitney?

It really does nothing for her. Maybe if it had a belt and gave her more shape it would look better.

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Jaslene Gonzalez strutted her stuff at the Chocolate Fashion Show in New York City on the weekend. She wore a Wonder Woman costume designed by season 4 alum Jack Mackenroth. The outfit is pretty fun and Jalsene looks like she’s having a ball working the runway.I love the airplane headpiece.

Image used with permission from Newscom

Jack was one of my favorite contestants in season 4. It’s great to see how active he is in the fashion community in NYC. And it’s great to see him giving work to a fellow reality-tv alum!

Jaslene Gonzalez made an appearance at Microsoft’s and USO’s ‘A Salute To Our Troops’ Pre-Show of the Radio City Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall on November 9. She looked cute in a modest top, full skirt and kept things festive with bright red shoes.

Se got into the spirit of things and posed with some photographs with the Rockettes:

I don’t know if it’s the braid or the outfit or what, but Jaslene looks really young in these photos. What do you think?