muse

The Wall Street Journal published an article a few days ago discussing the current trend of experimenting with “realistic” female models in fashion and beauty advertising to broaden product appeal. It focuses on Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty, which I have been watching with some interest since it was first rolled out a while back. Obviously it’s a bit loaded, but it really struck me as refreshing. The majority of the “models” the chose are strikingly lovely women, but not in the high fashion beauty sense.

The article also mentions a book that looks like an interesting and potentially disturbing read, Survival of the Prettiest : The Science of Beauty, by Dr. Nancy Etcoff. One thing that surprised me in their brief synopsis of the book was the observations that the author puts forth that different cultures find traits of cultures distant from them to be so unattractive that they mar the overall beauty of the subject. Maybe I am misinterpreting here, as I haven’t read the book. And it is a well known fact that what is “desirable” and “attractive” in the opposite sex varies profoundly by culture. But it recalled to mind a facinating hypothesis that I learned about in Social Psychology that stands in direct contrast to that assertion. It was a hypothesis that iinvolved the role of The Golden Mean in a globalized conceptualization of human beauty, and was entertainingly and thoroughly discussed in the TV production “The Human Face” with John Cleese. You can read about it for yourself, so I won’t expound on it here.

Of course, the subject of the golden mean as used in art, music, and other forms of “beauty” as conceptualized by humanity is a topic of frequent debate …

At any rate, there have been a lot of studies that have indicated people who have a globalized appearance (a genetic blend of many different races from around the world) are usually percieved as more attractive; and that those who most closely fit the “mask”of angles derived from the Golden Mean are considered to be universally beautiful regardless of race.

Interesting stuff.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 23rd, 2005 at 10:06 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.