The Hyper-real Body in Fashion Magazines

Abstract

This article is to understand the implications and ideological meaning of female normative beauty reproduced by the idealizing phenomena of the hyper-real body as a process of the normalization of the body projected in fashion magazines with a focus on the body created by the increased influence of mass media in consumer capitalism. This study conducts a literature research and semiotic analysis as the method of investigation and focuses on the body images of the beauty articles in Vogue Korea. The idealizing phenomena of the hyper-real body in fashion magazines emphasizes that the body is an exchangeable substance that can be disassembled to adjust to accord with the standards and norms of society, that the ability of individuals to manage their body is enhanced by a rise in social class, and concludes that the superficial alteration of the body image is related to the standard of a moral tendency where a young and slender figure is considered to be a well managed body image.

Types and Expression Characteristics of Model Poses in Modern Fashion Photographs -Focused on Patrick Demarchelier's Fashion Photos-

“…Research performed in connection with fashion photos and fashion models has analyzed images of models shown in perfume and cosmetics commercial photography (An & Kuh, 2004;Kwon, 2003), male models shown in fashion magazine (Kim & Kwak, 2012;Kim, 2006;Yun, 2010), body trends in models shown in fashion magazines (Lee & Yim, 2012), and the influence of female commercial models in fashion magazines upon female college students' self-esteem (Lee, 2011).…”