The Letter

I decided to show my letter visually, written in lipstick on a mirror in a girls bathroom. The use of the lipstick on the mirror relates to Maybelline, as the body image issue usually revolves around mirrors and what women see and criticize when they look at their reflection. The effect of this composition resulted in a sterile feeling, which relates to the depression and other emotional disorders relating to negative body image.

Here is a typed transcript of my letter:

Dear Maybelline,

Maybe she's born with it. Maybe it's Maybelline. But probably it's photoshop. 

Body. Image. Two words that I am sick to death of. 

It is due to companies like you, that those two words have become an overwhelming issue for young females like me. The amount of advertisements that your company produces that are exceedingly photoshopped and airbrushed to beyond belief, is atrocious. Even at the local chemist, your stall is plastered with images of models with invisible pores, meter long eyelashes and not a spot or freckle in sight. And what do I see when I look in the mirror? Something completely different. 

I understand that in today's world, photoshopping advertisements is common amongst cosmetic organizations such as yourself, but the image you are portraying to young women is harmful. Unrealistic images are abusing females minds into thinking that they should look a certain way, and need cosmetics to make them beautiful. Alarming numbers of young women have developed emotional disorders such as depression, anxiety, not too mention eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia from their own negative body image.

You are a company that is relying on consumer's insecurities to sell your products and I have had enough. The pressure in today’s society for females to look a certain way is overwheliming. Every women should be able to look in the mirror and see beauty, not criticism.

Maybelline, you need to adjust your advertisement campaigns in order help diminish this concerning body image issue. You must show images of women with real beauty, the way they really look. You need to celebrate flaws and realise that noone is perfect. This is the only solution into changing the unrealistic image that so many women are comparing themselves too. You can lift the morals of women all over the world through change. Be a leader in the cosmetic industry and start this change.

Holly Chapman

The Poster

I captured my poster on a clear window looking into the cosmetic department of a store. This store is filled of airbrushed cosmetic advertising campaigns, including Maybelline. I chose to show it here to capture the essence of the environment that Maybelline and other cosmetic companies sell their products in.

Using the precedent poster below as inspiration, I have created this poster. It explores the ideas of real beauty; that it should be celebrated in the media and in advertising campaigns such as Maybelline's, rather than hidden behind layers of photoshop editing and unrealistic editing. I used a mask as a symbol to convey this idea, as it represents what real beauty is hidden behind in the media. Using the grid composition, photographs capture different real women hiding behind the same blank mask, resulting in them becoming indistinguishable from another. The question at the end asks the question to why our real beauty is hidden like this, when instead it should be celebrated. 

Poster Precedent

Precedent design for my poster. Sourced from www.typographicposters.com

The Word

I decided to use the word "PRESSURE" for my word. Using pink wool as my thread, I created the word  intertwining it through the bars in the glasses. The idea behind it relates to the pressure women face, that is created through the intense photoshopping and unrealistic images of females portrayed in Maybelline's advertisement campaigns. The "pressure glasses" represent the pressure women see when facing these unrealistic images. I gained inspiration from fashion photo shoots and editorials similar to the ones seen in Maybelline's advertisements, in the way I captured the images of my word.