Make Me Beautiful

I love this. A young woman, Esther Honig, sent a barefaced picture of herself to photo editors in 25 different countries and asked them to modify it as they might in a magazine, to make her closer to the ideal female beauty. Many came back with surprisingly little done; a little color here and there, smoothing of skin tone, etc. But a few are so radically altered as to be unrecognizable.

Courtesy of Esther Honig

One editor in the United States shockingly infantilized her, making her look like a girl rather than a woman. Check out the fantastic side-by-side comparison of each to the original. Definitely a thought provoking exercise. I also think it would be interesting to ask artists in different countries to draw or paint a woman of idealized beauty to see how they differ or resemble each other.