Women in Advertising

A common theme running through my photographs of magazine adverts is of women. Examples of these:









































































I have been looking into women in adverts and how they are portrayed in the mass media. Beautiful, attractive women are found all over advertising. Advertising is notorious for promoting the 'beauty ideal', the exemplary female prototype. We are surrounded by the ideal female beauty.

Women strive to achieve this ultimate ideal of beauty we see all over the mass media, however this is inevitable. The ideal is based on absolute flawlessness. The models in the adverts never have any lines, wrinkles, scars, blemishes etc. Using computer software, the body and face of the model can be retouched, altering it to look perfect. This is creating women that actually do not exist.

A video I found highlights all these points, explaining what advertising tells us about women.

Killing Us Softly 3
Jean Kilbourne
2000