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Skinny Pretty Sexy (2020)
Buy this and you’ll be skinnier! Prettier! Sexier! Everyday we are bombarded by images of the “ideal” and given false hope that spending money on commercial products can help us achieve a thin, white, westernized beauty standard. The quest for a societally-accepted “pretty” is endless.
In "Skinny Pretty Sexy", the reappropriation of advertising/consumerist tropes re-contextualizes the conversation, allowing viewers to question the social mores and messages images can promote. The use of pink and muted pastels (stereotypically feminine colors) aims to reassert the power of femininity and enact a questioning and toppling of limited, gendered expectations that revolve around an idealized, physical appearance. Additionally, the ordering of the words Skinny, Pretty, Sexy is meant to send a subtle, yet universal, message of distress...an SOS (or in this case SPS) sent by a body drowning in a sea of expensive products that falsely claim to bring happiness via external appearance. The piece ultimately prompts viewers to question the images and products they encounter on a daily basis in a deep consumerist, media sea.
In "Skinny Pretty Sexy", the reappropriation of advertising/consumerist tropes re-contextualizes the conversation, allowing viewers to question the social mores and messages images can promote. The use of pink and muted pastels (stereotypically feminine colors) aims to reassert the power of femininity and enact a questioning and toppling of limited, gendered expectations that revolve around an idealized, physical appearance. Additionally, the ordering of the words Skinny, Pretty, Sexy is meant to send a subtle, yet universal, message of distress...an SOS (or in this case SPS) sent by a body drowning in a sea of expensive products that falsely claim to bring happiness via external appearance. The piece ultimately prompts viewers to question the images and products they encounter on a daily basis in a deep consumerist, media sea.
