Part One:
The first advertisement, the one for Sisley, is supposed to show two women "obsessing" over clothes. However, their way of portraying these women being "fashion junkies" is by implying that they are snorting the clothes up, as if it were cocaine. Notice how the only sex that is present in this advertisement is female, assuming that they are the only fashion junkies. Obviously shown is the way the two women look extremely high, and their deteriorating weight. The Valentino advertisement shows a man and a woman obviously promoting the sunglasses. But the man is forcefully ho
lding the woman's jaw, and she is shown with a pouty look on her face. The man seems as if he is powerful and is forcefully whispering something to her. The woman could potentially be seen as unhappy in the advertisement.
There are many underlying meanings for both of these advertisements. In the Sisley ad, one may take the model's skinniness and the implication of cocaine as women's desire to stay thin. This reinforces the beauty myth about white women's desire to be thin. Also, the implication of drugs could be targeting the modeling industry for models all being so skinny. The Valentino add, which shows the man grasping the woman's jaw, may be trying to imply that man has power over the woman. It is showing the dominant race as being man, and not showing the woman fighting back. Instead she is just letting it happen. He looks unsatisfied with her, and she looks unhappy about that.
Part Two: This Nike ad shows a woman who is very in shape, but who claims that her butt is big. However, she has seemed to embrace this and does not care what people think about it. I think that this advertisement goes against the dominant advertisements that show women and "beauty" because although this woman is very in shape, she is no where along the lines of the typical model skinny, and because is clearly states that if people don't like the way her butt is, they are "...invited to kiss it." If I were to create an advertisement that was supposed to empower women and men, then they would both be portrayed equally as strong as each other. There would be no body language to imply that one sex held power over the other, and there would be no provocative use of drugs, sex, or partying.
In my opinion, the two girls in the Sisley advertisement look extremely trashy. This puts women at a very low point, and it doesn't make me want to buy their clothes. When I look at this ad, I feel like it's implying that if you buy these clothes you will become obsessed and start doing cocaine. This advertisement makes women look very easy to take control of and almost helpless.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Hannah--that ad does not make me want to buy their clothes. It's sad that they are being portrayed like that. The sunglass ad is also very degrading for women. I never thought about how many ads have men forcefully touching a woman or trying to silence them until we discussed it in class Wednesday. But I really like the Nike ad--a good message for women and also has Nike promoting that they support women athletes. However, at the same time, the woman is barely wearing clothes which just shows how even an ad trying to promote women strength they have to have a woman with barely any clothes on.
ReplyDeleteWow, the Valentino ad is scary! The way he's grabbing her is very possessive and violent. And because sunglasses are covering the woman's eyes and eyebrows, it's hard to make out her expression. She could be unhappy or afraid and nobody would ever know. And I like how the Nike ad displays a woman with an athletic, healthy body as someone who is strong and independent.
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