Advertising gender roles - Research

Brainstormed ideas for practical photography:

• Using a male model wearing something that may be seen as female or promoting makeup - idea of destroying stereotypes- destroying the idea that makeup is only for women. 

• Use studio. white backdrop. 
• Silhouette photography - silhouette of male and female figure both wearing the same clothing asking the question, who’s who? showing that clothing does not matter
• Silhouette of male with a female object.

• Disagreeing with gender roles - the idea that society is now equal. Explore with colour. 
• Clothing of Victorian era in black and white for a man, blending into new clothing and colour for women. 
• Concept that explores more of breaking stereotypes for men relating to a female attribute, different to a woman wearing clothing, for example. 
• Idea of labelling. Use a price tag as a silhouette object, keys for properties. Card cut into the outline of a female on a key-chain. 
• Could take perspective that women have more rights than men, equality is not reached and many have perceived femininity wrong. Something symbolic. Subtle messages over something visually evident.

Gender roles: Specific norms, values and behaviours constructed by society, given to male and female genders.
Modern day gender roles: In my opinion, I think that gender roles within society have decreased and are not as major as they were 20/50 years ago. Movements and continuous fights for rights have allowed women to gain the same equal rights as men, such as the right to vote, to work, own properties, etc. Research behind my photography will therefore consist of post modern theories & post feminism.

When researching advertisements that use male figures to promote cosmetics, I stumbled across L'Oreal's advertisement - "This is an ad for men." Though the stereotype is separate to one in which I wish to break in my photographed ad, I found it interesting. L'Oreal have visually intrigued the dominant associated makeup gender being females by using cosmetics, but then captured males attention through the language - "This ad is for males," along with the graph type composition. L'Oreal have visually placed the makeup so that is spilt in a graph type manner to capture the attention of men who are in possible high positions e.g businessmen, linking it to something that they see and use everyday and take seriously, like makeup to women. The companies reason behind using cosmetics linking to graphs is to promote the idea that women need to be taken more seriously in terms of becoming successful business-women and being in charge to abolish the gender pay gap.



Anastasia Beverly Hills advertisement - Promoting makeup for male's

https://wwd.com/beauty-industry-news/beauty-features/beauty-brands-market-makeup-men-10678934/

After brainstorming ideas, I have decided to take the route of breaking stereotypes for males by using something feminine related - makeup, for the opposing gender. Advertising makeup for males breaks the constructed idea of only females using beauty products, built after years of advertising females in this medium. Hollywood's makeup brand Anastasia Beverly Hills practised this perfectly for the promotion of their new highlighting product “Glow kit." The makeup brand promoted the product using portraits of various men, also contributing to intersectionality, in the case that these men are of different colour representing different ethnicity's. For my practical photography, I therefore have ideas to use a male model using props, such as a mirror, with the male wearing makeup and looking at a angle into the mirror, or with a brush applying something to their face with confident expression They could also have an under eye mask on, influenced by the photograph of males promoting skin care products shown below. This symbolises that men should be able to and are allowed to be intact with their beauty and self care, without it being labelled as a 'feminine' thing.

Contextual facts -
- The first Covergirl poster to feature a male figure in 2017, using beauty influencer James Charles.
- 56% of the modern generation know others who refer to themselves using gender neutral pronouns, such as "they"
- https://wwd.com/beauty-industry-news/beauty-features/beauty-brands-market-makeup-men-10678934/

For my second set of photographs still under the idea of breaking stereotypes for males, I would like to take the perspective of hiding emotions. Men are constructed to be strong and tough both physically and emotionally, breaking through this and showing audiences, in particular male audiences, that being emotionally intact is okay, and that they are allowed to feel. Influenced by the photograph of actor Timothee Chalamet, I may practise silhouette photography / high key studio photography with a male model covering his face, eyes placed down. Within Adobe Photoshop, I may add a catchy text slogan, such as "Have you checked up on your (brother, son, dad boyfriend, etc. yet to be decided) recently? This shows the audience that males can still be struggling, and I may add some statistics as a magazine cover may do, such as the fact that more men struggle with mental health problems and commit suicide more than women. Using silhouette photography symbolises the idea of hiding, and contributes to my personal studio development. I hope to apply knowledge on photography that I had applied last year for the photography of my previous final project when practising silhouette photography.

Pre production text -
In terms of using Adobe Photoshop in order to advertise the product in a billboard manner, I must consider text size, font, composition and slogans, labels, etc. Chanel's advertisement, for example, has text that plays the main role in terms of advertising. Chanel have taken a simplistic point of view, placing the text in the foreground with a recognisable font and simple white colour, making the poster look visually pleasing. Simplistic, white text seems to be a trend, as shown above in the Anastasia advertisement, more just as a logo / label for the makeup brand. Depending on the intensity of my final photographs, this may also be a route I would take, where less is more. A line of language could have a huge effect, depending what is being said using language. Possible slogans include:
- "Express yourself"
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