Debenhams has taken a stand against airbrushing, and revealed the tricks of the trade by releasing a 'before and after' airbrushed image from its latest swimwear campaign.
Laying bare the digital enhancements made in many advertising images, the shot shows how the model's body would have been altered by the airbrush, reducing her waist, slimming arms and legs, boosting her cleavage and plumping her lips.
The side-by-side pictures will be displayed in the department store's flagship Oxford Street branch window with the banner, 'We've not messed with natural beauty; this image is unairbrushed. What do you think?'
Debenhams has vowed to ban all airbrushing from future campaigns and fashion imagery.
Mark Woods, the retailer's director of creative and visual commented, 'We want to help customers make the most of their beauty without bombarding them with unattainable body images.'Our campaign is all about making women feel good about themselves, not eroding their self belief and esteem by using false comparisons. Not only does it make sense from a moral point of view, it ticks the economic boxes as well. Millions of pounds a year are spent by organisations retouching perfectly good image,' he added.
Jo Swinson: “Ban airbrushing in children’s adverts”
“Real Women,” a new policy paper from the Liberal Democrats’ women’s policy group, has proposed a set of measures to protect women and girls from body image pressure and to encourage healthier lifestyles.
These include:
· Children to be protected from body image pressure by banning airbrushing in advertising aimed at under 16s
· Adverts aimed at adults to indicate clearly the extent to which they have been airbrushed or digitally enhanced
· Cosmetic surgery advertisements to give surgery success rates
· Modules on body image, health and well-being, and media literacy to be taught in schools
· Schools to include greater choice in physical activity to stop teenage girls dropping out of exercising
· Money to be invested in improving school and community sports facilities to make them cleaner, safer and more female-friendly
Jo Swinson MP, who leads the group, said:
“Today’s unrealistic idea of what is beautiful means that young girls are under more pressure now than they were even five years ago. Airbrushing mean that adverts contain completely unattainable images that no-one can live up to in real life."
“We need to help protect children from these pressures and we can make a start by banning airbrushing in adverts aimed at them."
“The focus on women’s appearance has got out of hand – no-one really has perfect skin, perfect hair and a perfect figure, but women and young girls increasingly feel that nothing less than perfect will do."
“Liberal Democrats believe in the freedom of companies to advertise but we also believe in the freedom of young people to develop their self-esteem and to be as comfortable as possible with their bodies. They shouldn’t constantly feel the need to measure up to a very narrow range of digitally manipulated shapes and sizes.”
Government pushes for airbrush ban
The Government is pushing for health warnings on airbrushed images in adverts in an attempt to promote promote body confidence.
The news comes as equalities minister Lynne Featherstone gets ready to meet with advertising executives and magazine editors to discuss how to stop promoting unrealistic body images.
In an interview with the Sunday Times, the minister said that she will push for a Kitemark or health warning on airbrushed photographs, warning viewers that they are not real. “I am very keen that children and young women should be informed about airbrushing, so they don’t fall victim to looking at an image and thinking that anyone can have a 12in waist. It is so not possible,” said Featherstone.
In her interview, Featherstone says that she wants to see more women of different shapes and sizes used in magazine photoshoots, including curvaceous role models such as Christina Hendricks (pictured), who plays the office manager Joan Holloway in Mad Men, the US TV series about the 1960s advertising industry.
Her comments follow calls from academics and Lib-Dems last year to lobby the Advertising Standards Authority to introduce notices on ads that feature airbrushed models.
A letter from academics Dr Helga Dittmar of the University of Sussex and Dr Emma Halliwell of the University of the West of England was sent to the ASA, with the warning of the negative impact that airbrushed images can have on the self-esteem of young people, especially when it makes models look super-thin.
In the past, beauty brand Dove, celebrated for its groundbreaking ’real women’ ad campaign, has also come under attack following allegations that the pictures, which featured ordinary women in plain, white underwear, had been digitally altered. Unilever-owned Dove denied the claim.
