Corruption to the ideal beauty

Often in todays society women are stereotyped to perform, look and behave a certain way to fit in and be the modern society's idea of perfection and beauty. In today's society women have to adhere to an ideal that is unattainable for most. Adam smith suggests, 'physical beauty is determined by the principle of custom'. Each person finds something they are more accustomed to as more beautiful. Therefore, because we are used to seeing one common display of beauty, we feel that is the goal we have to obtain to be perfection. The media plays a primal role in our perception of beauty. I decided to look into artists that played on the idea of beauty and corrupting it, to create a different type of beauty. The first artist I looked at was Rosanna Jones and her project 'destroyed innocence and beauty.' She stated that, 'These particular images are about false identity; the idea that we can hide, disguise, manipulate and compress our identity, sometimes by choice, sometimes subconsciously.'

Her images captured the rawness and unique beauty of that person in an interesting and unusual way. Each of the images had a clear focal point on the person, through the effect of small depth of field from the paint. I liked the natural tonal qualities to the paint used, and the subtle pink tones that where imbedded into each image. I liked that the women where nude as I felt it again gave it a raw and personal feel to the image. That each 'normal' women could relate to.

I felt that her images explored the idea of a unique and 'normal' beauty in an interesting way, however, I wanted to explore more artists, so that my images had another interesting angle to them.

The next artist I looked at was May Xiong for his project 'no clue' and Maurizio Anzeri's project in Dazed magazine. Both of these artists used the idea of lines and shapes to create interesting affects to the body, exploring contextual ideas of the exploration of beauty in today's society. Maurizio used string sown into his images to create the aesthetic of the strings making the people behave in a certain way. For example, one of his images is called confused because the string is pulling his mouth open in a shocked pose. I liked the use of string as I felt it created another interesting aesthetic and feel to the imagery. Moreover, I felt that I could use the string to explore my ideas of the pressure from society that is put onto women. May digitally created lines onto the image to create a similar result. Her lines structured the faces and created a clear focal point onto the models. Moreover, she used paint on the models faces to again create an interesting aesthetic. I felt that I could use this to my advantage at exploring different types of pressure women face.

For my images I decided to explore themes from all of these artists. Experimenting with previous images I had taken. Trying to explore themes that represented the pressures and stereotypes that women face in society.

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The first image is called 'fastidious' which means, 'very attentive to and concerned about accuracy and detail.' I decided to call my image this as I felt that the string in her back was holding her up straight, which displayed the idea that she is conforming to the idea that women have to be presentable and always well mannered. I decided to use white and pink paint as I felt that it linked with the project, as both colours have stereotypical meanings linked with women. Pink is often associated as a feminine colour and white is insinuated as purity, which is what most men think women should aspire to be. My second image is called 'conventional' which means, 'based on or in accordance with what is generally done or believed.' I decided to call my image this because the paint and string is focused on the pose so is creating with her body, which is a typical fashion pose and it creates a sexualised feel to the image. I felt that this pose related to how women feel there is a way we should pose and look in pictures to be attractive. For my last image I called it, 'Flawless' which means, 'without any imperfections or defects; perfect.' I decided to call my image this as I painted over her face. I thought this symbolised the fact that women are often super imposed by photoshop in the social media today, and are created to look flawless. It creates an unachievable goal for women and therefore creates insecurities about our bodies and how we look.

I am pleased with the outcome of my images so far, however I am going to explore the project further, so to investigate more into how I can corrupt the image and still create a sense of beauty, that is contrasting to the norm.