A cover photo for Intelligent Life magazine caused a small
stir recently because it dared the unthinkable: show a celebrity's
actual face. Cate Blanchett, 42, appears on the cover in little makeup,
her smile lines and wrinkles un-retouched. She looks less like an
Hollywood star and more like a dignified human being, like someone you
might see drinking tea at a neighborhood Starbucks.
Compared to this photo, other images of Blanchett look plastic. The April cover of Harper's Bazaar
also features her, but it shows her with perfectly smooth porcelain
skin and smoky eyes. Her neck looks carved out of stone, her appearance
as timeless as Galadriel in The Lord of the Rings, an unnatural immortality brought about through the magic of Photoshop.
She isn't the first to go enhancement-free in a photo. I remember
Jamie Lee Curtis doing something similar a few years back with a bit
more fanfare, featuring a photo spread that showed every step of
enhancement along the way in a normal shoot. The makers of Dove beauty
products have been pushing the "Campaign for Real Beauty," a series of
promotions celebrating beauty that doesn't fit the stereotypical mold
for cover models. But these efforts, like the Intelligent Life
cover, are significant only for their rarity. Photoshop is the norm,
whether you're shooting family photos, senior portraits, or billboards.
It's become so normal that we hardly even notice it anymore, and
that's what makes it all the more insidious. Behind the
wrinkle-removing, curve-enhancing, waist slimming work is a satanic
ideology of youth and beauty. Continue at Mike Cosper
