Collage

Digital Scans!

Nancy Burson: Beauty Composites

In today's society everyone is constantly attempting to exhibit an "image" of themselves to others. The purpose of this image may be different depending on the individual. Some want to look different and stand out to make a statement. Others want to blend in. Overall, most people want to look attractive and beautiful. Whether they want to look like all the "beautiful" models in Cosmo or embrace their own beauty varies. Anthropologically, humans see beauty in symmetry. So a person with the golden ratio appears more attractive scientifically. A person with symmetry would have a nose starting directly between the eyes, even lips, etc. Scientifically, women with bigger hips and men with big muscles are also attractive. This all is due to the fact that people with symmetry often have good genes to pass on. Women with big hips are built for child bearing and men with muscles can protect a family. In today's day and age, these factors still may play a part in our brain's deciding what is attractive, but individual's have personalities. Different people attract for many more reasons now. So beauty is relative. Nancy Burson explored this idea of beauty by morphing images of women who were widely thought of as "beautiful." In the reading by Christiane Paul, he talks about morphing as transforming images together. In Nancy Burson's Beauty Composites she created two images. The first image combined the faces of Bette Davis, Audrey Hepburn, Grace Kelley, Sophia Loren, and Marilyn Monroe. The second combined the faces of Jane Fonda, Jacqueline Bisset, Diane Keaton, Brooke Shields, and Meryl Streep. Her focus was on beauty as seen by different cultures and decades.

I really found Nancy Burson's project to be interesting. Every culture, society, age group, etc has a different perception of what is beautiful. In American culture in the 1950s, many people thought of the women whose faces combine to create the first image to be beautiful. The women in the second photo were famous actresses in the 1980s. The differences in what was seen as beautiful in the 1950s and thirty years later are obvious. The differences aren't huge, but they are visible. Beauty and attractiveness is something that consumes the thoughts of people around the world throughout life. Everyone wants to be perceived as beautiful by someone. It is interesting that what is seen as beautiful changes throughout cultures and over time. This is what I think Nancy Burson wanted to show through this project. I think that part of the issue that Burson was presenting is that these ideals for beauty that are decided by society and culture at any given time are sending a message that there is only one type of beautiful. When teenage girls and even women see the tan, skinny, "beautiful" women in magazines, they strive to make themselves look as close to these images as possible. This causes people to lose their individuality. I remember in high school, all the girls tried to look the same. They all wore bronzer to look tanner. They kept their hair long and straightened it everyday. They wore Uggs, leggings, and North faces. It was as if a uniform was required for looking pretty.

I think Burson's project was brilliant. Yes all of the women she used to create these images were beautiful, but when they are all morphed together they lose their individuality. Girls today are losing individuality by trying to look like the ideal beautiful girl of the time. I think it would have been interesting if Burson had expanded this project to several other cultures to see how different cultures perceive beauty over time. It would be interesting to see what different areas of the world think of as beautiful.

Links:

Image

I got some information on Burson's work here.

Nancy Burson's website

First Day of Class!

I look forward to learning about digital art this semester! This website talks about the different kinds of digital art: http://digitalart.org/
Here's a cool picture I found online. I think it was probably digitally edited on photoshop or something. I found it at http://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.stevegoslingphotography.co.uk/images/general/steve_gosling_photography.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.stevegoslingphotography.co.uk/&usg=__CuOLofaePv8ag67ILPjbKrktrJg=&h=400&w=400&sz=25&hl=en&start=7&sig2=jASFBUQGIjTZP-7uhbMCEg&zoom=1&tbnid=9B4fvRMLEvTrXM:&tbnh=124&tbnw=124&ei=rHo4TbmwI8PLgQf1qNytCA&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dphotography%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dsafari%26sa%3DN%26rls%3Den%26biw%3D1227%26bih%3D616%26tbs%3Disch:1&um=1&itbs=1