Photographer’s ‘American Beauty’ Shots Celebrate Bodies Of All Shapes, Sizes
Real “American beauties” comes in all shapes, sizes, ages, and ethnicities. But they’re not always represented as such in the mainstream media, which has proven over and over again to be lacking in diversity.
Perhaps you caught the backlash over Instagram’s new ban of the hashtag #curvy, or the recent revelation that black models sometimes have to bring their own makeup to fashion shoots?
Particularly in the face of those recent events, San Francisco-based photographer Carey Fruth’s attempt to redefine beauty standards is a breath of fresh air.
Her photo series “American Beauty,” features 14 diverse women – young, old, skinny, tattooed, multi-racial, and more – lying naked in a bed of lilacs. The series was inspired by the 1999 movie American Beauty’s famous rose petal fantasy scene, where a middle-aged man fantasizes about his teenage daughter’s bestie – who happens to fit the mainstream beauty standard to a T: she’s blonde, attractive, thin, and white.
“Almost every image you see in mainstream media is of one type of woman, thin white women to be specific,” Fruth told The Huffington Post. “America is made up of all types of women. Women who are hungry to see themselves represented in a beautiful way. And why shouldn’t they?”
With these images, Fruth hopes to empower women to feel beautiful, confident, and sexy in their own skin – just the way they are. The images are stunning, and even the several of the models themselves have expressed how “liberating and empowering” it was to pose.
We call that a huge success for womankind. Bravo, Carey Fruth!
