viz. - body image

What's Haunting Dove's Real Beauty Campaign?

clsloan — Mon, 21 Apr 2014 13:57:29 +0000

Every image is haunted by the excluded. Every social movement is haunted by flaws. After reading Avery F. Gordon's Ghostly Matters: Haunting and the Sociological Imagination and Nivedita Menon's Recovering Subversion: Feminist Politics Beyond the Law, I became a bit haunted by the possibility of subversion. These two texts tell us that ghosts, in various forms, are absolutely everywhere, and after ruminating on their content and methodologies, I started to see ghosts, too.

Gordon's book criticizes canonical sociology being far too focused on the present, the physical and the empirical, and for failing to account for “missing” and the “disappeared” subject positions. These absent presences, the ghosts that haunt our supposedly complete accounts of societies and histories, need to be accounted for. The ghost, for Gordon, is “the sign, or the empirical evidence if you like, that tells you a haunting is taking place. The ghost is not simply a dead or a missing person, but a social figure, and investigating it can lead to that dense site where history and subjectivity make social life” (8). In other words, what societies exclude, keep out and make abject are, paradoxically, at the very heart of cultural meaning.

At first glance, Menon's study seems pretty far removed from Gorrdon's subject matter. While Gordon's book makes itself tantalizingly fantastic by splaying references to ghosts and hauntings all over its cover page, Menon's text looks pretty down-to-earth. Weighty, serious terms like “politics” and “the law” indicate no-nonsense subject matter. Imagine my surprise when I realized that Gordon and Menon's projects actually share a lot of crucial points. Menon, like Gordon, suggests that cultural movements are haunted by unintended subject positions. Menon emphasizes the overwhelming power of discourse and demonstrates that even apparently revolutionary action can backfire if it's energized by problematic reasoning. Menon gives the general example of abortion “rights” early in her book: pro-choice discourse that claims abortion as a “private right” for women who deserve to make their own decisions about their own bodies necessarily forecloses on the possibility that abortion could be a public concern that requires, for example, insurance coverage or even subsidies. Menon focuses on legal discourse, but we can infer that all social movements and campaigns are bound by the rules of intelligibility: what can be said is limited by what makes sense given the current cultural climate. Because of this intrinsic problem with discourse, that only culturally available ideas are, well, available for mobilization, revolutionary discourse becomes haunted by counter-revolutionary possibilities, the ghosts of future oppression.

When it comes to the difficulties of emancipatory discourse, people craving equality for various gender and sexuality subject positions have certainly struggled with some double-edged swords. The highly volatile, highly relevant, intensely current debate on gay marriage springs to mind. By appropriating the universalizing discourse of the normalcy of monogamous marriage, many gay couples strive to secure valuable legal rights and cultural intelligibility. On the other hand, does this appropriation simply re-affirm the value of monogamy, the desirability of a capitalism-driven “normalcy”, and/or erase the multiplicity of queer experience in favor of the bourgeois “loyalty, romance and procreation” model of sexual relationships in mainstream culture?

Another interesting movement, a supposedly all-inclusive self-esteem builder for women, has been picked up by the Dove soap company. Their “Real Beauty” campaign strives to differentiate Dove from other hygiene or clothing product companies that rely on exclusive, unattainable ideals of attractiveness to sell their merchandise. This advertising scheme (which can, perhaps, double as a social statement) implies that our current standards of beauty unfairly exclude women who are too old, too fat, too ethnic, too “physically flawed.” Instead, Dove's visual ads argue that our concept of beauty needs to expand so that we see all women as beautiful. Of course, there are some problems here. The image of “beautiful” women of diverse races and body types is haunted by a few obvious exclusions: women with blemished skin, women with disabilities, women who might not be immediately recognizable as women, women who aren't sparkling and clean who, perhaps, can't afford Dove soap. Isn't it unfair, though, to criticize a soap company for not suggesting that dirty women can also be beautiful? I can hear some of my practical friends asking. Not when their ad campaign focuses on beauty as an all-inclusive category, I can hear myself snidely responding. Like “universally recognized rights,” “universally recognized beauty” seems like a completely unattainable dream.

And even if it weren't, even if we could exorcize the ghosts from this image and convince the world that beauty is, indeed, about confidence and personal pride, are there any discourse-related problems we should be thinking about? About a week ago I came across a public-service campaign. There were several signs taped up on stall doors and beside mirrors in a public women's restroom. Drawn in marker on colorful construction paper, they assured the reader, “You are beautiful!” and that “Beauty has no rank order.” Even as I recognized that the campaigners certainly meant the absolute best and were doubtless motivated by great intentions, I was immediately prompted to wonder: so I deserve to be encouraged about my beauty but not my happiness, my intelligence, or my ability to help others? The signs, even in kindness, even in the suggestion that all women were beautiful, relied on the discourse of attractiveness to empower. Self-worth is still couched in terms of physical appearance, even if we're getting a bit more generous with the required criteria.

Lilo & Stitch: The Danger of Beautiful Stories

Scott Garbacz — Mon, 10 Feb 2014 14:00:00 +0000

Image credit: captured from Netflix.com

If Frozen (as my previous blog argues) gleefully revises Disney’s traditional iconography, Lilo and Stitch does something far more interesting. Both are, in their ways, re-telling of fairy tales, but Lilo and Stitch proves far weirder, as well as far more intelligent, than its visually-immaculate descendent. We have already discussed Lilo and Stitch once at the Viz blog, praising it for its ability to subvert the “prince charming” narrative. Yet Lilo and Stitch is certainly worth at least one more look. The film is, in fact, both far more critical, and far more thoughtful, than Frozen is. Indeed, the film (despite its rough spots) is sophisticated and thoughtful in a lot of ways that Frozen never dreams of being, and may have something quite important to say about the way we engage with popular children’s stories.

The scene at the heart of the film—and I am aware this may be a contentious statement—involves neither of the female leads, but rather Stitch, Lilo’s hyperactive, destructive, pet alien “dog.” Near the climax of the film, when Stitch is finally coming to be accepted by his nontraditional adoptive family, he uncharacteristically runs away. Taking Lilo’s beautiful picture-book of The Ugly Duckling, he vanishes into the woods; there, in the rain (of course), he expresses a sorrow previously alien to his nature. “I’m lost,” he cries, before the scene fades to black.

Image credit: captured from Netflix.com

The scene would be puzzling, and seems to break with the film’s otherwise-reasonable plotting. Stitch has a lot of deficiencies, to put it mildly, but a lack of directional sense is not one of them. Nor is he particularly prone to deploy creative metaphors, or to express heartfelt narratives of any sort. Helpfully, however, the film gives us a key image to let us understand Stitch’s plight. Moments before, the camera showed us the page Stitch was reading; an image of the Ugly Duckling, alone, wishing for his family to be reunited with him. Stitch, in fact, emulates the Ugly Duckling’s pose as he mimics the story’s dialog, while the virtual camera floats to the proper height to cement the visual similarity.

Image credit: captured from Netflix.com

The moment has a cruel brilliance to it. Stitch misses the point of the narrative even as he re-enacts its climactic scene. Already, he had found his kind—Lilo loved him unconditionally from the first, and even her older sister Nani was forced to accept that he counts as ohana, part of a family where “nobody gets left behind and forgotten.” In any other Disney movie, Stitch would have come to a saccharine realization that the story of “The Ugly Duckling” is about his relationship with Lilo and Nani, and would have come to a happy ending then and there. Instead, he is unable to see the two orphaned sisters, who yell at each other and inhabit a house full of unmade dishes and filth-covered stoves, as part of the same world as an elegant swan and her children. So he waits, in the woods, repeating the phrase “I’m lost” while hoping that such mimicry will automatically generate the happy ending that the fairy-tale promised. A fairy tale that many people see as beautiful and true becomes, for Stitch, an elegant lie that keeps him from embracing his true family.

Indeed, in the film’s portrait of Kaua’i, a magnificient island whose tourist industry never seems to generate enough money to provide security, beautiful and polished stories can only be the enemy of practical wisdom. Lilo’s friends, for instance, each are equipped with Barbies, all modeled after their own complexion yet impossibly thin, tall, and elegant.

Image credit: captured from Netflix.com

Lilo, however, is bored with simple stories. Her doll is an adorable, muppet-like monster named Scrump whose life is soon to come to a gory end. “Her head’s too big,” Lilo says, “so I pretend a bug laid eggs in her ears, and she’s upset because she only has a few days to—.” Delivered in her cheerful, indomitable voice, the line doesn’t feel particularly morbid but rather testifies to Lilo’s vibrant inner life, filled with life-and-death struggles whose fantastic SF elements insulate them from the concerns of her fragile daily existence. Her friends, on the other hand, are bored, if not grossed out, by Lilo's ability to love a doll that isn't manufactured to demonstrate an artificial perfection. They leave the scene before she can even finish the sentence.

Poor Scrump. Everyone's afraid of him! Image credit: captured from Netflix.com

If that early scene wasn't enough to emphasize Lilo's distaste for conventional narratives, another comic scene (recorded, but sadly never animated) drives home the point. Hearing one too many rich, grotesque, continental-American tourist repeat the same boring question ("where is the beach?") Lilo launches her own poetic revenge. Using her local connections, she makes sure that a siren is going to be tested, then convinces the tourists that the test actually heralds a tsunami that moves "faster than the speed of sound." Lacking any sense of curiosity or independent thought, the Lemming-like tourists flee in a panicked herd. The local CPS officer doesn't share their morbid glee, but Lilo lets him in on a secret. "If you lived here," she says, "you'd understand." Lilo's love for the morbid and bizarre has, it turns out, some specific roots: a bitter frustration of dealing with insensitive outsiders who refuse to recognize the humanity of the natives.

Older sister Nani seems too busy for stories; she’s constantly scrambling to get a job and prove to the local Child Protective Services officer that she can function as a decent mother. Even so, she shares with Lilo an ability to inhabit a world of dark fantasy and a distaste for conventional narratives. When she’s fired from her waitress job, her first reaction is to call it a “stupid fakey Luau.” Her second is to tell Lilo that “The master’s a vampire, and he wants me to join his leigon of the undead.”

The obsession that Lilo and Nani have for rough-hewn narratives also applies to rough-hewn people. Lilo and Stitch probably features more diversity than any Disney movie not starring animals, and Lilo, at least, loves it. She collects photos of people—all obese, all living rich and fulfilling lives. Looking up at these people whose body types prohibit their participation in any other Disney movie, she draws only one conclusion. “They’re beautiful,” she says. Such courageous vision is probably the reason she can tell her own horrific story without flinching; looking at a photo taken before her parents died, she speaks simply and plainly. “That’s us, before. It was rainy, and they went for a drive.” Then she turns her attention back to Stitch. “What happened to yours? I hear you cry at night. Do you dream about them? I know that’s why you wreck things, and push me.”

"They're Beautiful!" Image credit: captured from Netflix.com

I have a harder time loving the movie as a whole than I do its characters, themes, and often shockingly-precise dialog. Stitch brings with him a lot of space-opera insanity that would be joyous in another movie, but here seems an unwelcome violation of the film’s otherwise gentle and thoughtful tone. I’m not sure how the audience is supposed to feel, for instance, when Snitch takes a chainsaw to Lilo and Nani’s house. It’s wacky fun at the time, but then we have to face a distraught Nani, who races home in anguish just as she’d finally found a decent job, and has to watch in despair as her sister is carted off by the sorrowful CPS officer.

Despite its rough edges, Lilo and Stitch pulled in nearly $150 million at the domestic box office, not quite the blockbuster numbers of Frozen, but a decent profit for a film with a budget of only $80 million. Sadly, while the success of Lilo and Stitch may speak well of the average American moviegoer, only Pixar has come close to producing the same sort of thoughtful, emotionally-complex storytelling, and they have had much more success with boys than girls as protagonists. Lilo and Stitch remains, then, as a unique, flawed masterpiece—and above all a warning about the stories we tell, the images we show, and the damage done when people are sold a pristine image of life whose glamor they will never be able to equal.

Frozen: The Anatomy of a Gaze

Scott Garbacz — Wed, 29 Jan 2014 14:00:00 +0000

Image credit: The Guardian

The first song composed for (but ultimately cut from) the recent Disney blockbuster Frozen explicitly engages with Disney's presentation of female characters. In the song, entitled "We Know Better," young princesses Elsa and Anna lay out a laundry list of objections to the traditional idea of a "Disney Princess." The film's two heroes refuse to be the sort of princess who "always knows her place," insist that a real princess “laughs and snorts milk out her nose," and maintain their right to mention “underwear.” Though whimsical, the film sets out its heroines' priorities: the only things they take seriously are their sisterly friendship and the political demands of ruling the realm. In climactic two-part harmony, the girls promise to "take care of our people and they will love / Me and you." If films like Tangled and Brave taught Disney that their princesses can (quite profitably) take center stage without dressing up as boys, Frozen insists that its female leads will be more concerned with national policy than with the clothes they wear.

The film's feminist aims were reflected in early reviews. NPR discussed the film's hit single, and the message of empowerment that many tweens heard in its lyrics. Social media exploded with a list of "7 Moments that Made Frozen the Most Progressive Disney Movie Ever." On the other hand, Frozen came under fire for perpetuating some of the worst tropes of the very "Disney Princess" genre it mocks. From critiques of Elsa's embodiment of Disney's Madonna-whore dichotomy to concern over the ridiculous gender dimorphism of its CGI character-models, the movie collected criticism as well as praise from feminists. Frozen was often compared unfavorably to Lilo & Stitch, a movie with its own fascinating treatment of social narratives.

In this post, however, I'm not particularly interested in praising or condemning Frozen so much as in understanding how it works. In particular, I want to draw attention to a visual contradiction that I see energizing much of Frozen. On the one hand, the the film claims to be a reversal of what we expect from a Disney film. On the other hand, in its meticulous computer animation actually displays a deep reliance on the sorts of traditional, emotional-powerful images created by Disney and other culture-makers over the years.

Take, for instance, the following freeze-frame, an image featured in various promotional materials, including (as seen below) Disney.com's website for the film:

Image credit: Disney.com

This image is particularly powerful because, in its essence, we have already seen it a million times in previous fantasy films and cartoons (though never, perhaps, executed with such icy beauty or complexity.) A young protagonist gazes upon an exotic, striking location, while the viewer's gaze is drawn along the explorer's eyeline through careful image composition. At the top of the image is a distant, female beauty, more of an icon than a person; Elsa's face is an indistinguishable blur, looking over her elegantly-clad shoulder as her dress swirls about her.

Such an image announces its continuity with previous riffs on the same motif, such as the scene where Prince Phillip hacks his way towards his future wife's magical castle in Sleeping Beauty, or the scene where Alladin's titular hero looks out at the city of Agrabah while dreaming of the life lead by its princess, Jasmine. Indeed, the parallels from the former seem particularly striking. Frozen is the first "ultra-widescreen" Disney fairytale since Sleeping Beauty, and Eyvind Earle's detailed, decorative background work on Sleeping Beauty stands as a predecessor for the elaborately ornate (yet often-threatening) nature of Frozen's arctic scenes.

The two protagonists' red, flowing capes are also suspiciously similar. Image credit: Evensi.com

If Frozen shares much in common with Sleeping Beauty, it also follows T.S. Eliot's dictum that "immature poets imitate; mature poets steal." The most obvious shift is one in the characters' gender and motivation. Where Prince Phillip seeks merely to rescue his love and obtain the obligatory "happy ever after" of marriage, Anna's goals are doubled--even doubled against each other. She seeks to be reunited with her sister and thereby restore their family bond, but she also wants to save the realm from her sister's magic, a political task that places the two of them in a (potentially) adversarial relationship. Within this freeze-frame, then, it is fitting that Anna herself is duplicated. While Elsa's body faces away from the reader and seems ready to confront Anna, her reflected gaze points vaguely to the right of the image, her mouth slightly open in uncertainty. This doubling might also be seen to echo Anna's larger character-arc, in which she longs to be the heroic masculine figure capable of saving the realm from Elsa's sorcery, but also wants to be the beautiful ingenue, "Fetchingly draped against the wall / The picture of sophisticated grace." Anna is no prince charming--but she sure can dress for the role.

One thing is certain. In aligning the viewer with Anna, Frozen both re-creates and revises one of Disney's most oft-repeated images. Whether this hybridity represents a feminist deconstruction of a powerful gender stereotype or a hypocritical "feminist" gesture in a story mired by inherited images and old forms is a philosophical question beyond the scope of this blog. That such a question might emerge from a single freeze-frame in a popular Disney film, however, is a testament to the power and complexity of images, even those images that flash momentarily on the screen in one of the year's many blockbuster entertainments.

The Visual Scandal of Freeing the Nipple

clsloan — Mon, 20 Jan 2014 14:07:15 +0000

Image Credit: Huffington Post

In 2005, the artist Jill Coccaro was arrested in New York for exposing her breasts in public. In 2012, Jessica Krisgsman was arrested in New York for topless sunbathing in a park. In 1992, New York courts ruled that banning female toplessness in public violated equal protection clauses and, as a result, it became legal for women to bare their breasts in the state. Apparently, the memo about the legal rights of topless women is still in circulation. Social activist and actress Lina Esco is slated to release her film Free the Nipple in June of this year. The movie will explore American cultural discomfort with the alleged “lewdness” and “indecency” of women going topless. Esco has written several fantastic Huffington Post progress reportsfor her project, chronicling the struggles she has faced in the composition of her movie , struggles like police involvement during filming and battling social media networks that have banned her accounts for putting up pictures of partially nude women. Esco also beautifully captures her own bafflement about what she sees as bizarre standards of American morality, asking why “acts of baroque violence, killing, brutalization and death are infinitely more tolerated by the FCC and the MPAA, who regulate all films and TV shows in the US.” Shooting a film about breasts has proven more difficult that shooting a film about, well, shooting. The Free the Nipple campaign has attracted the attention, and largely benefited from the patronage, of celebrities like Miley Cyrus, whose December tweet on New York toplessness laws generated quite a bit of internet buzz. Her tweet was accompanied by a photo of her flashing the camera, breasts colorfully covered with photoshopped hearts.

So what are the stakes of normalizing the public exposure of female breasts? Some activists identify the controversy as a fight for equal rights. Since men are not subject to regulation or judgment for being topless, women shouldn't be, either. Many affirm that prejudice against women willing to bare their breasts in public is an archaic, leftover standard from puritanism in America's background. According to this view, American culture has decided that female b reasts are inherently sexual in nature and that no situation exists that could strip them of their “natural” sensuality. Those fighting to normalize the sight of female breasts argue that th e notion of inherent sensuality , based in religion for some, evolutionary determinism for others, and collective ideas of common decency for still more, objectifies and hypersexualizes the female body. For example, if all I want to do is sunbath, maybe catch up on my reading in the park, how can I be blamed for inflaming the lusts of those around me? Only if female breasts are innately sexual.

In a case where one side of the argument is primarily concerned with the way women's behavior impacts men, in this particular case through unsought arousal and possibly even moral contamination, it's pretty safe to say that I'll be found firmly in the opposing camp, setting up a tent and looking for a clean water supply because I'm prepared for a long stay . Is there any possible way, though, to argue that normalizing toplessness somehow doesn't serve the best interests of women? It seems to depend on whether or not we take certain social truths for granted. Emily Yoffe caught a lot of flak for writing about the relationship between binge drinking and sexual assault. Yoffe's article, in an attempt to be practical and helpful, encourages women to avoid heavy drinking at parties so that they will not be targets of sexual predators. Other feminists responded negatively to Yoffe's opinion piece, arguing that her “helpful advice” was just another form of victim blame. Women, they assert, should be able to drink without fearing assault . Louise Pennington responded to Yoffe with an article of her own, snappily titled “The Best Rape Prevention: Tell Men to Stop Raping.”If we assume, with Yoffe, that sexual predation is a simple, tragically unfortunate fact of life, then topless women might be making themselves vulnerable to objectification, even physical danger. It would be a sad truth: our society is incapable of responsibly handling the public liberation of the female body. Contra a Yoffe-like position, opponents could argue that the normalization and legalization of toplessness would serve to deconstruct our cultural belief that breasts are inherently sexual, thereby demystifying the female body and helping to decrease objectification. I find myself a firm supporter of the latter idea, but I continue to be impressed with the varied, arguably feminist responses to what can and can't/ should and shouldn't be seen of the female body.

Fashion Misfires: The Hunger Games II.

Jenn Shapland — Thu, 05 Dec 2013 20:17:11 +0000

Image: author's own, photo of December 2013 cover of Vogue

To round out the fall 2013 season of viz, I follow up on Suss’s latest post re: the Hunger Games and the rhetoric of fashion. As Suss makes clear, the new film Catching Fire portrays style in the districts as Depression-drab-chic (to put it generously). Which is all kinds of problematic. In the continuing buzz surrounding the movie's release, however, I've noticed that it's the outrageous outfits of the Capitol dwellers that capture the most media and corporate attention.

Take, for instance, CoverGirl’s Catching Fire makeup line. The twelve “looks” in the Capitol Beauty Studio (no joke) are inspired by the ridiculous costumes every district’s tributes wear to garner the favor of the wealthy Capitol patrons. Internet hounds have been all over this, critiquing the makeup line especially harshly in relation to the book series’ anti-capitalist message; selling makeup like this misses all the irony of the book's portrayal of wealthy Capitol style, in which makeup is used as kind of a big practical joke on poor people. On the lighter side, you can see the line in action on the Hairpin's a-mazing video series "Just the Tips." [If you have some time to kill this time of year, you can also watch them attempt to wear sweatshirts under dresses (spoiler alert: doesn’t work).]

Or take a gander at the latest issue of Vogue, like I did while walking through the airport over Thanksgiving. One of the headlines on the cover reads "Hunger Games: Does Intermittent Fasting Really Work?" I didn't have the stomach to turn to the article and find out what it is they mean by "work." (Make you intermittently hungry, I presume?) Instead, let me provide you with Hunger Games star Jennifer Lawrence's response to a fan’s question about body image. When asked, “What is your response to people who judge others based on their appearance?” JLaw replies, “Well screw them…What are you going to do, be hungry everyday just to make people happy?”

If we listen to Vogue, it seems the answer might be a resounding “yes.”

Via http://www.botoxchronicmigraine.com/

And finally, while we’re at it, can we talk about how frequently and inappropriately the Capitol catchphrase “odds [ever] in your favor” has appeared in ads lately? Have you seen this Botox commercial? Are you as freaked out as I am? Botox people, why are you threatening us?! Perhaps they think repeating the refrain of a fictional community that forces kill to other kids for fun is, in fact, the best way to sell migraine medication. But also: since when is Botox a cure for migraines?

There you have it, viz readers. When we put all the facts together, one thing becomes clear. The only truly fabulous style to emerge from The Hunger Games is Jennifer Lawrence's ALH.*

Via Autostraddle, via Jennifer Lawrence’s Facebook

*that's alternative lifestyle haircut, y'all

Misusing Miss Universe?

clsloan — Tue, 12 Nov 2013 14:43:06 +0000

Image Credit: Gulfnews.com

There are some things that even I, in all of my high-minded preachiess, feel squeamish about approaching. The gender studies climate in my field has been influenced by critics who laud the values of embracing “girl culture,” celebrating personal gender choices, and moving away from blaming an insidious patriarchy for indoctrinating women. However, I can't help but notice that social and economic inequality still haunt gender divides, and, politically speaking, it might be responsible to keep harping on glass ceilings and body image issues until everyone acknowledges that sexism, like racism, is still a “thing” in American culture. How does one properly balance these two positions? I struggle with this question constantly. Take the Miss Universe pageant, for example.

Casually flipping through images of contestants on the internet confirmed my assumption that “beautiful” women are still expected to be remarkably thin. Fears of inspiring anorexia in young women aside, the very notion that individuals can, and implicitly should, compete to be declared gorgeous makes me antsy. Doesn't this unfortunately suggest that there's one, and only one, proper way to be beautiful? I don't think there's an event that pits different genres of music against each other or judges various schools of painting using one set scale. Subjective taste and context come into the equation somewhere, and we seem to respect that in many cases. Why haven't we reached a point where different body types and face shapes can be appreciated for their uniqueness instead of put into direct competition? In case I'm starting to sound a little too idealistic, I'll admit that highly publicized beauty pageants do at least promise to offer avenues for national pride, individual excellence, and perhaps even social change. Titi Yitayish Ayanaw is the first black Miss Isreal. Miss Bulgaria Veneta Krasteva is currently in remission for breast cancer and uses her title to raise awareness about the disease. In 2012, Jenna Talackova became the first transgender woman to compete in a Miss Universe Canada pageant. Do these landmark women signal social change? Should we celebrate their achievements or remain concerned over their adherence to specific beauty standards?

Larger social concerns aside, what about respecting a woman's decision to actively pursue pageant titles? After all, feminist movements have emphasized a woman's right to do what she pleases with her body. Can beauty pageant contestants be chastised for doing just that? To further complicate the issue, aren't all cultural standards for excellence as arbitrary as beauty, anyway? Shouldn't individuals be able to decide where they want to try to shine? For example, I certainly wouldn't win any community service awards, but I do try to keep my friends entertained with tomfoolery. If I had grown into a tall, slim stunner I would probably be irked at critics who wanted to impress upon me the “subjugation” of women upheld by beauty pageants.

There are certainly conversations to be had about the social implications of beauty pageants, with decent points on various sides, but I will firmly declare that some of the requirements for competing to become Miss Universe are absolutely, 100% ridiculous. According to the Miss Universe FAQ page, contestants must be between 18 and 27, because we all know that women simply stop being attractive when they hit 28, right? They also can't be married, can't ever have been married, can't be pregnant and can't have children. I'm so confused about the message here. Isn't the point of the Miss Universe pageant to award physical excellence? If so, then why all these restrictive requirements? Why the emphasis on being single? On not being a mother? Arbitrary standards of beauty are one thing, and they definitely deserve discussion, but I can't even come up with a hypothetical scenario to defend arbitrary requirements for even being considered visually gorgeous.

Visibility, Physicality, and Size Acceptance: Substantia Jones of the Adipositivity Project

ladysquires — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 12:59:15 +0000

(Image Credit: Substantia Jones, Adiposivity.com)

Substantia Jones is an award-winning, Manhattan-based photographer whose work has been featured in The New York Times and showcased at galleries and shows throughout the Northeast. Her website, The Adipositivity Project, is dedicated to documenting and celebrating bodies that are typically invisible--except as negative examples--in modern media. In her own words, Substantia promotes size-acceptance "not by listing the merits of big people, or detailing examples of excellence (these things are easily seen all around us), but rather, through a visual display of fat physicality. The sort that's normally unseen."

I was thrilled to have the opportunity to exchange emails with Substantia and develop a post that would showcase some of her favorite photographs. Her answers to my questions are in bold. Many of the photographs below are NSFW.

Welcome to our blog, Substantia, and thank you for taking the time to talk with me. What role do you think images play in shaping our acceptance of different bodies and what role do you see your own work playing?

It's my pleasure, and thank you for your interest.

Images are as important in creating body acceptance as they are in creating body shame. My view of the role I play has changed over time. My original goal was widespread bombardment of fat-positive images, in hopes of changing mainstream minds, super-double-reverse-Clockwork-Orange style. Instead it's become something that has more of an impact on the subject, than on the mainstream. But increasingly I'm hearing from those who occupy the lower end of the size spectrum. Some revolutions are slow and steady. But no less effective.

While so many people have found your photography inspirational and life affirming, I imagine it would be a bit terrifying to appear in them, especially since, as you say on your website, these are regular people, not models. How do you develop a rapport with your subjects and encourage them to reveal themselves in such vulnerable (though compelling) ways?

By the time someone contacts me and asks to be an Adiposer, I presume they've already done all the "Can I really drop trou for a stranger's camera?" work. Many lose their nerve during the scheduling phase (far preferable to losing their nerve during the me-ringing-their-doorbell phase, which has happened). But I think when (and if) they open the door, they see a smiling fellow fatty--a comrade--who wants the experience to be good for all involved. What we're doing is indeed ridiculous, so we usually laugh at lot. That helps. As does a cocktail.

In your early photographs, the faces of your subjects are almost always concealed, and you had a very specific point to make with that choice. I've noticed that you include a lot more faces in your most recent work. Why the change?

Lately I've been interested in capturing how a fat person exists in their environment. Going faceless in that situation would make it appear that I've removed something which belongs in the image. That's not what I do. I'm perhaps also influenced by the fact that increasingly, Adiposers want their faces to be included. I still love the close-up detail shots, though. They'll never go away.

The choice to conceal faces always struck me as interesting given the "headless fattie" phenomenon in journalism about dieting and obesity. Those photographs, which usually just feature a disembodied stomach always seemed to be encouraging viewers to dehumanize fat bodies while simultaneously encouraging them to think "that could be me" and feel subsequent shame. Do you see yourself as subverting or playing off of that convention?

A disembodied stomach in a grease-stained T-shirt, no less. And usually moving much more slowly than those around them. Never do they show a fat belly bouncing along on a bike or a ball field. That wouldn't support the alarmist junk science they're purveying.

While it's a kick to co-opt the format and repurpose it to promote fat acceptance, I've never thought of it as particularly subversive. In fact, I believe it's among the least subversive things I do, perhaps because it wasn't the biggest motivator in my decision to put the observer's eyes on the vessel, rather than its contents. Subverting media's use of the grease-stained belly is certainly in the mix, but it's not among my top few reasons for doing it. It's primarily a creative choice, and one I think has been validated by the fact that Charlotte Cooper, the fierce London activist whom it's said first coined the term "headless fatty," has posed for The Adipositivity Project. More than once.

Though almost all of your photographs are nudes (or feature the subjects in "revealing" clothing), your erotic photographs, particularly the 2011 Valentines Day series, are particularly striking. Do you see those photographs as particularly subversive? Why do you think it is important to portray fat people as (healthy) sexual beings?

Love and sex are as important to the wellbeing of fat folks as they are to those of smaller size, and displays of such commonalities are important humanization tools. Both groups need to see more of them. Everyone wants to see their lives represented in media. Fat people's lives include love and sex, yet while the largest percentage of entertainment is about love and sex, rarely are the subjects fat. I'd really like to knock a few dents into that paradigm. Plus, it's hot.

Not only do you feature a variety of body sizes and types, you seem to take care to feature women of all races, and I've been noticing more photographs of male bodies and of gay couples. What role do your photographs (and fat acceptance more generally) play in promoting diversity across a range of intersectionalities?

I wouldn't presume to be qualified to answer this with any accuracy, but I believe I understand (as much as is possible for a white, cisgendered hetero to understand) the reluctance to get involved in a campaign in which you don't see people who look like you already present. Factor in that if you're part of another marginalized population, your energies may be spent correcting injustices elsewhere. But one would hope that seeing one's self visually represented in a fat acceptance effort might encourage more queers, transfolk, people of color, the disabled, men, etc. to become a part of the movement. I think we can all learn from one another's struggles without it turning into the oppression Olympics. It's not a contest, and weight-based discrimination is most certainly not "the last accepted form of prejudice." Sorry, Oprah. It just isn't.

(Re)Composing Bodies - Giovanni Bortolani's Fake Too Fake

Cate Blouke — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 12:30:00 +0000

Giovanni Bortolani, from the Fake Too Fake series

Using some seriously inventive (and at times disturbing) photoshop, Italian artist Giovanni Bortolani has created a series of photos about the composition of the human form. While the image above suggests a relationship between the body and the organic by superimposing a leaf skeleton on a man's back, most of Bortolani's photos in the series explore bodies in terms of that which is "fake" or constructed. The images in Fake Too Fake are jarring, but they ask us to consider what we're doing to our bodies in this age of plastic surgery and diet pills. NSFW (and somewhat gruesome) material after the jump.

Giovanni Bortolani, from the Fake Too Fake series

Though Joseph Ayoub from White Zine (a website about digital arts) argues that Bortolani's images "can sometimes be too trashy," I think that many of them make interesting and complex arguments about visibility and identity. Juxtaposing male and female, black and white, inside and outside, Bortolani questions how identity is constructed or shared. What is the relationship between inner self and outer appearance?

While the images might be rather risque for some classrooms, it would be an interesting exercise to ask students to come up with captions for these images, or to treat them like advertisements with slogans. The solitary, brooding model is reminiscent of the Calvin Kline underwear ads, and the arguments these images make would certainly fit the context of celebrity, body image, sex, drugs, and rock and roll. I can imagine several of these images as strikingly effective anti-drug advertisements which wouldn't be too far off from the scare tactics of current campaigns. Of course, that could also open up a conversation about rhetorical fallacies, but the images are unquestionably effective in terms of getting our attention.

A Posterior for Posterity

Kimberly Singletary — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 13:00:00 +0000

Temeca Freeman via J'Adore Magazine

On 10 March, 2011, Germany’s Pro7 TV aired a story about U.S. “po” model Temeca Freeman in New York City for Fashion Week. As a butt model, Freeman voluntarily welcomes people to stare unabashedly at her backside. But Pro7’s story went beyond a curious stare and into a visual “fressen” – a German term which means to devour, or consume like an animal. NSFW content after the break.

Temeca Freeman via GLCityMusic

Although the video, which has been edited as more than 4 different stories with at least two different reporters, is dubbed into German, one doesn’t need German to visually devour Freeman; the camera eye acts as lingua franca. Freeman’s portrayal is reminiscent of the treatment of Sarah Baartman, the Hottentot Venus, a Khoikhoi woman made into a one-woman traveling show, in part, for her large bottom, in 19th Century Europe.

When Freeman goes to her first massage, for example, one reporter tells us, “Here we come, the first time, in the enjoyment of [Freeman’s] curves. Everything’s real, claims the Po Model.” Note that our visual enjoyment of seeing Freeman on the massage table is more important than her enjoyment of a massage; the statement also throws into doubt Freeman’s claims about her naturalness. We, the presumably majority white, male German audience, are given authority over Freeman’s body to verify or reject her claim. In another video, the white, male masseuse is asked verify her claims.

Freeman’s story also featured clips from an earlier story about U.S. butt model Nicole “Coco” Austin; the stories were spliced together as if in conjunction, highlighting stark differences in how white, blonde Austin, was portrayed compared to Freeman. Freeman wistfully outlines her dream of being world renowned, and the camera jumps to Austin who stresses that hoping without work ethic isn’t enough. (Austin's advice: we can't all be scientists: some of us have to work at McDonald's) Austin is identified as a butt model and internet millionaire, while Freeman, “wants to make a career with her butt,” – despite having notoriety enough to be backstage at Fashion Week.

These women and their backsides represent American excess, but they’re not presented as equally excessive. Austin’s beauty is verified through her financial success, though Freeman’s bum, the reporter notes, is 4 centimeters larger than Austin’s. Apparently, it’s not the size of the butt but the beauty of the butt’s owner which determines success.

Double exoticization is at the heart of this German story, whereby mythical America, represented as New York’s hopefulness or the cynical, hardened sexiness of Hollywood is paired with an invitation to stare at racial difference, to see exactly what it is about black women that makes them so (un)sexy, (ab)normal, (freakishly) desirable. The Pro7 stories use the butt to re-center white women as the standard of beauty, to bestow rights of ownership to white males to speak for black women, and to Other the black body.

Nicole "Coco" Austin via Coco's World

To see "Trend Mega-Hintern," one of the versions of the stories featuring both Freeman and Austin, please click here. (NOTE: This video is apparently only visible in Germany.)

The Athlete by Howard Schatz and Beverly Ornstein

ladysquires — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 15:00:00 +0000

(Photo credits: The Athlete by Howard Schatz and Beverly Ornstein, via SocImages)

Thanks to fitness magazines and the weight loss industry, we've become acculturated to the notion that fitness looks a certain way. This photo collection by Howard Schatz and Beverly Ornstein challenges our assumptions about athleticism by presenting Olympic athletes with an array of body types, ranging from the typical "shredded" bodybuilder look to bodies that we might view as "unhealthy" in a different context.

As illustrator Nina Matsumoto states:

I tend to fall into the trap of drawing the same body type over and over for athletic characters. This photoshoot serves as awesome reference reminding us artists that strong bodies come in all kinds of shapes and sizes and muscles show up in different ways. It also helps us keep in mind that not everyone who is fit is also lean. There’s often a layer of fat over the muscles, making them less visible for some.

In addition to the collection's commentary on body diversity and assumptions about fitness, I appreciated the simple fact that the athlete's sports were printed underneath their photos. To me, they provoke reflections on the fact that athletic bodies are trained to peform a specific task at an elite capacity, and thus each of these bodies is therefore "elite" in its own particular way. That's probably seems terribly obvious, but I find it helpful to be reminded that bodies can and do function at extraordinarily high levels even if they don't necessarily conform to stereotypes about "fitness."

I also found it refreshing that while all of these bodies are scantily clad, there is nothing particularly titillating about the photographs. Contrast this collection to the Sports Illustrated swimsuit shoots (photos at link potentially NSFW) featuring Olympic athletes. Photos of female athletes for popular magazines in particular tend to feminize and even infantilize them. Furthermore, they inevitably privilege the body types that most conform to modern standards of "hotness" and focus on Olympic events that have, for what ever reason, become the "sexy" events (volleyball, gymnastics, swimming, skiing, etc.).