I decided to buy a Vogue magazine for the remix project, because I knew I would find plenty of images pertaining to gender, particularly femininity, which is what I wanted to focus on. This untouched image of a black, chubby-cheeked little girl with braids and a smile as bright as the sun was the only one of its kind in this magazine. Out of 646 pages in the March 2014 issue of Vogue, this simple black and white image stopped me dead in my tracks. It was the most relaxed and natural photo in the entire magazine. The photo left me feeling joyful and warm inside.
For the remix portion, I thought of Kohl’s article, and decided that I was literally going to deface this gorgeous portrait. I began cutting out pictures of eyes, lips and noses from various makeup ads. I replaced her natural braids with silky smooth untraditional African American hair fastened back by white roses. I also played around with the idea of giving her an African-inspired necklace with an oversized diamond pendant domineering the lower half of the composition. I wanted to play around with the irony of America supporting femininity as long as it was on America’s terms. It is funny that in a magazine like Vogue, which gets lots of their fashion inspiration (bright colors and bold prints) from Africa expects their models of that heritage to suppress their own ethic attributes of that culture. The irony of this is sad but evident.
Photo Credit
Vogue March 2014 Issue #08449
No comments:
Post a Comment