Barkan worked as a fashion photographer for fifteen years in Paris, London and New York, before returning to Israel in 1998 to open his own modeling agency in Tel Aviv.

It was heavily promoted through advertisement on bus stops, although it was discontinued after less than year due to low sales and public outcry about its indecency.

[5][6] After speaking on television about his experience with model Hila Elmalich, an anorexic woman whom he rushed to hospital after she collapsed and who later died, Barkan was deluged by telephone calls from girls and young women with anorexia.

This experience persuaded him to require all of his models to submit to body mass index (BMI) exams to demonstrate their physical health and lack of an eating disorder.

[13] As part of the RealUnreal Project, Barkan travels around the country to create awareness among IDF soldiers, male and female, on the subject of eating disorders.