Supermodel Essay

The Supermodel and our Society

The picture of a “Supermodel”(Included from In Style magazine) is an ideal image of women in today’s world. I choose it because of the artwork’s generic representation of women and beauty during our time, and therefore what women aspire to look like. The model’s picture can be found on billboards and magazines alike, with the same blank face and elongated features that make her beautiful, according to the ad agencies. Beauty and masculinity don’t generally go hand-in-hand in this society, and for a woman who wants to be taken seriously in society she must have both.   Interestingly enough, many of the supermodel’s features have been shown in ways that were considered high fashion in other periods. Her limbs are extremely long, similar to that found in the Mannerist style. A softly draping shirt lies delicately on the model as a characteristic of the classical Greek look. Lastly, the amount of materialistic possessions that she has just illustrates our society’s hunger to have everything.
Mannerism arose in the 16th century and it used the features that were considered high fashion during the time and extenuated them even more in art. An example would be the Madonna with the Long Neck, by Parmigianino(Gardener’s p. 269). The Madonna is an excellent depiction of Mannerist taste for strange proportions with long arms, torso, and neck, making it a very abstract artwork. Parmigianino’s Virgin girl has an extremely long neck that almost looks like that of a giraffe’s neck, with a tiny head placed on top of it at a strange angle. The rest of the Madonna’s extremities follow the same lengthy pattern as her neck, specifically her elongated torso that extends for almost a third of the picture. The “Supermodel” has a similarly abstracted neck like the Madonna’s, except her head doesn’t look like it’s about to oddly roll off. Her lengthy arms are crossed, making the supermodel look impatient and dominating. She sends off a strong signal...