Body Image & Materialism

Through developing ideas of themes I came across the idea of further researching how media portrays in particular the female body image, and how we are constantly told we need certain products in order to be happy. I was inspired by the fact that our complete outlook of ourselves could in fact of been brainwashed into us from an early age with the surrounding media.
Our aspect of what we find attractive and what we think looks good all depends on our upbringing and culture and I've found that quite an interesting topic.
I've been looking at a range of magazines such as Glamour, Elle etc. to look at the sort of language and imagery used in order to convince a certain audience to alter their image and to become something or someone different.
I've looked a a few supporting articles as well as existing adverts/campaigns/animations that link to my theme of body image and materialism, and the distortion of self image throughout.

The Changes in Body Image in History
As research I have been looking at a range of articles to compare the historical aspects of advertising the beauty and how this has changed over the years. In particular it has been with women where there was a certain size that had to be maintained in order to seem fashionable. I find it interesting how this has changed over the course of the centuries of fashion and how women have constantly felt like they had to change themselves in order to be accepted.
In earlier years there was the corset in order for a smaller waist to be maintained, whilst nowadays it seems like the larger ladies are recently in favour for being curvier. In the 1950's it was fashionable to gain weight rather than lose it whereas coming up in the 1990's was the aspect of becoming skinnier and losing weight.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/28/women-ideal-body-types-history-buzzfeed_n_6566254.html 

(Images taken from internet sources and articles and blogs on history of body image)

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2012/jun/10/body-image-anxiety-eva-wiseman - Article on Body Image Anxiety

Dove Campaign
Although a huge beauty company, Dove began a campaign about body confidence in 2008, addressing the fact that the large production of products and advertising is having an impact on the younger generations. I like the overwhelming factor that this video gives and the fact that we are surrounded by media telling us what to do.

DOVE "Onslaught" from SUPERGROUP SONIC BRANDING CO on Vimeo.

 Body Dysmorphia Disorder http://www.dailymail.co.uk/video/femail/video-1190317/See-Body-Dysmorphic-Disorder-sufferers-experience.html


Effects Media has on Body Image

Anorexia & Body Dysmorphia
Since the aspects of beauty advertising began there was always

Colleen Clark I find this artist when on Tumblr, she's a young degree student who draws up modern comics about the impacts that media has on body image generally.

Articles I've looked at-
I've begun to look at some articles that will involve the theme of body image and the effects that it has on the human mind, and I found it interesting that they have discussed the idea that sad people are actually the biggest buyers. Without us being sad about how we look we wouldn't buy anything new.
(The article is found at https://mic.com/articles/111228/how-western-beauty-ideals-are-hurting-women-across-the-globe#.f4PHZuuC1)
It's also interesting that the aspect of Western culture effects people globally, with aspects such as hair relaxing to get rid of the natural curls some women have, as well as the aspect of skin whitening.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-29569473

As an exploration of the materialism side to things, I have found this hyperreality motion graphics piece particularly interesting as it explores the aspect of materialism in the modern world, and it shows how overwhelming it could soon become. I like the aspect of all the pieces being so overwhelming and in your face all the time. There's also the aspect of changing their identity which to me is important, as I feel that identity itself is an underlying theme within my work.

HYPER-REALITY from Keiichi Matsuda on Vimeo.
HYPER-REALITY from Keiichi Matsuda on Vimeo.