As discussed in the breakdown of Em’s Instagram and the different personas which she takes on throughout her personal life, there is a persona which finds power, comfort and enjoyment in presenting herself in a very sexual way, celebrating her body and experimenting with both make-up and cosmetic procedures.
I am looking at my case studies in a manner of almost fairytale like versions of how they see themselves, as well as this I will also be looking at and taking reference from the historical and culture nature of what has influenced these personas.
In the case of this particular one I began by researching into beauty ideals throughout modern and historical culture, such as shrinking of the waist, foot binding and many more. By learning about these and symbolism that each one held such as wide hips and tiny waist to communicate that although slim and healthy, this woman has “child bearing hips”. By combining all of these beauty ideals in one image it was my aim to create what should be “the perfect woman” Combine this with the styling and narrative that I also choose, the story becomes about celebrating women, regardless of what they choose to do to themselves. Further to this it was also my aim to include all of these ideal simultaneously as a comment on how much society asks from us.
In terms of styling and making clear what slant I wanted to take on “The Beauty Queen of Instagram” I kept thinking along the lines of how we should be viewing each other, how sad and reductive it was to take so much notice of how we all look. I then thought in terms of looking up to each other and celebrating each other like we do with any great powerful icon, combine this with ideas of great beauty I happened to start researching into Goddesses throughout history, predominately of archetypal symbolism of love, beauty, femininity and Power. In particular Aphrodite. https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09g0k3j ‘Venus uncovered: Ancient Goddess of Love’ is a fantastic documentary that really enlightened me to the fact that the artworks that have been produced of Aphrodite for a very long time have actually been gazing upon her in a purely sexual and reductive light, Bethany Hughes goes on to explain that the ways in which Aphrodite was originally viewed was as an all powerful, multidimensional figure head. Someone who held great powers in love and lust as well as torment, holding the power to destroy the lives. In this way she was greatly respected. This struck a cord with me in the sense that this is what is missing in society. I believe that we look upon each other as such linear beings, forgetting how complex we all are. This greatly inspired me when story boarding the whole shoot as I then set out to tell the story of the many dimensions of a woman. She is strong, she is vulnerable. She is caring, she is distant. She is light, she is darkness. She is human.
