Are Magazines Ruining Your Health?

[Taken from http://www.empowher.com/]

HER WRITER

Nina Jacinto

This week’s French Elle magazine had me thinking about the long debated issue of retouching photos and how it might affect women’s health.

The magazine features Monica Bellucci and several other female celebrities photographed without any makeup or retouching work. Last month, French public health officials, in an effort to prevent normalizing eating disorders, proposedthat magazines state the extent to which their photos are retouched. An op-ed video by Jesse Epstein in the NY Times argued why this may be valuable: retouching and piecing together images of models negatively changes our standards of beauty and perceptions of health. A quick glance atretouching examples on the internet shows how standards of beauty or perfection are manipulated by photographers and artists in order to sell a particular message.

The studies that show the prevalence of body image issues among young women are plentiful. A 1997 Garner surveyfound that 89% of female respondents wanted to lose weight. A 1980 survey found that young girls are more influenced and affected by cultural standards of body images than boys. And a 1999 study found that 70% of the 550 young working class women surveyed believed that images in magazines influenced their notion of the ideal body shape. Unhealthy body image could lead to unhealthy dieting, overeating and other eating disorders, which could lead to larger mental and physical health issues. Women who are not comfortable in their own skin may be unsatisfied in their romantic, personal and sexual relationships.

Like nutritional information on the side of food packages, I think there could be value in letting readers know to what extent pictures have been reconfigured. Readers would be constantly reminded of the work that goes into creating particular images for marketing and advertising purposes. Perhaps it would be a step towards being open about the relationship between women’s health, body image and media representation.

Still, there is much more work to be done in providing proper education about beauty and health standards for women, especially among young adolescents. Access to healthcare, proper health education, maintaining a healthy diet and focusing on one’s well being will be bigger steps to reinforcing positive body image for all women.

I leave you with a clip of Susie Orbach, who was interviewed on The Colbert Report about her new book, “Bodies.”

Nina Jacinto is a freelance blogger living in the Bay Area. In addition to writing about reproductive and sexual health, she is a racial justice blogger at Wiretap Magazine.

Solve Sundsbo

His bizarre, cleverly manipulated images have made him fashion photography’s hottest new star

By Lena Corner

From http://www.independent.co.uk

When fashion photographer Solve Sundsbo started his career, for a while it seemed as though he would get no further than the dole queue. “People would say to me, ‘I’m not sure I can hire you, I’m not sure what you’re doing. What is your style?’ I was mortified and thought I was never going to make a living as a photographer.”

The problem was that curiosity had got the better of the young Norwegian and he couldn’t help but embrace every photographic technique going. His work incorporated everything from X-rays and 3-D scanning to hi-tech manipulation and laborious hand-painted retouching. “If I’ve got a style,” says Sundsbo, “it’s that I’ve got no style.”

Undeterred, and still in his early twenties, Sundsbo hopped on a plane to London to set about seeking his fortune. And four months into a photography course at the London College of Printing he got a call from Nick Knight, who was looking for an assistant. For a young fashion photographer, there are few better places to start. Knight is not only regarded as one of the world’s most visionary fashion photographers, but his Show Studio gallery continually pushes the boundaries of artistic possibilities. “It was hard – almost medieval in the way that you devote yourself utterly to your teacher for nearly four years. But you get that same devotion back from your teacher.”

 

Watchdog blasts digital distortion

from the Winnipeg Free Press, Canada

By: Misty Harris

A Canadian media watchdog is calling for restricted use of Photoshop and other methods of digital enhancement in magazines, both in editorial photographs and in advertising.

Media Action’s criticism of the widespread practice of retouching photos — which can include the removal of everything from fat to frown lines on models and celebrities — comes as the United Kingdom’s Periodical Publishers Association launches its own inquiry into industry “Photoshopping.” The association announced plans this week to create a working group with the British Fashion Council and top U.K. magazine editors to discuss a possible ethics code governing the use of computer technology to adjust body appearance.

Shari Graydon, a director at Ontario-based Media Action, says changes to publishing practices regarding such digital wizardry are long overdue.

“Readers have a right to expect authenticity from the photos magazines disseminate,” says Graydon. “If we can’t trust that the images we’re looking at reflect reality, why should we credit the words that appear alongside them with any greater truth?”