Body Pressure
The following is results for an assessment that required students to critique a magazine via a collage of images from magazines, vector images and text.
These results are critiquing a Cosmopolitan magazine and the effects it has on young women and body image.
Body Pressure is the title of the posters. Their aim is to emphasise the weight placed on the shoulders of female youth due to the imagery portrayed in magazines. To represent this, a mixture of both body imagery and objects within a Cosmopolitan magazine that relate to beauty standards and metaphors for weight were used to create the collages.
Inspiration to critique body image derived from reading about successful collagists and coming across Hannah Höch, a German photomontage artist. Höch critiqued dominant society views in their work and showed an active interest in the status women held in society during her time[1]. I found Höch’s posters powerful yet simple and wanted to create a similar effect with mine. Many of Höch’s collages depicted women made up of different photographs and cut-outs, their faces are often warped yet still looking relaxed or happy. This style was influential when choosing suitable images to cut out and during the planning process of the layout.
The decision to follow a similar arrangement and create a woman’s face with a mixture of different images allowed collage one to contain multiple examples of unrealistic bodies and create a slightly morbid view on the topic as the features don’t match up. The phrase accompanying this poster “Wake up girl, you’ve got the dreamer’s disease” was trigged after hearing the song ‘You Get What You Give’ by New Radicals. The actual lyrics “Wake up kids. We’ve got the dreamers disease” strung a cord which induced the thoughts of comparison between dreaming and reality. The way women imagine the perfect body is hugely different to the truth and realistic goals they can reach. This phrase was placed purposefully next to this collage as it highlights the unrealistic expectations of women via facial features and body parts that have been altered from reality to look like the perfect woman.
The second poster depicts a young girl on her knees vomiting a collage of torn body parts and flowers. This design was inspired by Hanahaki Disease, a fictional disease were the victim coughs up flower petals due to a one-sided-love[2]. The relation of a one-sided-love between a person was shifted to a love for a perception instead, meaning the girl in this poster is vomiting because she is in love with these images but doesn’t love herself as a result. This fictional disease was used because it portrays the intended message of the posters whilst remaining within context of body image and beauty in a morbid way.
The design of the text was inspired by Barbara Kruger, an American conceptual artist. Kruger’s posters are commonly black and white collages overlapped with bold white-on-red captions that demand attention[3]. This design made the words Kruger included powerful and eye catching, thus I followed a similar process and outlined the phrases on my posters with a box of colour drawn from the collages. In doing so, attention is drawn to the poster’s wording and makes the message bolder and a more prevailing quality of the poster.
[1] “Hannah Höch,” The Art Story Modern Art Insight, accessed May 25, 2018, http://www.theartstory.org/artist-hoch-hannah.htm
[2] “Hanahaki Disease,” Fanlore, accessed May 25, 2018, https://fanlore.org/wiki/Hanahaki_Disease
[3] “Barbara Kruger,” TATE, accessed May 30, 2018, http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/barbara-kruger-1443
Variations of the collages
Vector designs
Text Options
First version - The message is unclear and the collages are over the top and taking attention away from the underlying meaning.
Second Version - Overall the message is clearer, however, the girls are fading into collage and "vomit" on first girl's shoulder is wrong.
Third Version - The message is clear, however, the text isn't achieving the powerful message I desire to portray.
Final Version
Critique
These posters aim to portray the negative effects body image has on young women. These final results achieve this aim thanks to the clean layout and emphasis on text that balances each aspect.
