“In the U.S., Photoshop has become a symbol of our society’s unobtainable [sic.] standards for beauty. My project, Before & After, examines how these standards vary across cultures on a global level,” Esther Honig writes.

Honig is a 24-year-old human interest journalist who recently discovered cultural gaps in an entirely new light. Via websites that allowed her to connect with freelance Photoshoppers in more than 27 countries around the world, Honig paid between five and thirty dollars to “make [her] look beautiful,” to discover if there really is a global standard for beauty.

According to one of her ads on SimplyHired, she sent an unretouched portrait of herself without makeup and with minimal lighting…

to have it altered and enhanced by photoshop experts from all over the world. To clarify, I want someone to take the time to truly alter this portrait, NOT just retouch. The idea is that you, the photoshop pro, take whatever creative direction you see necessary to make this image more beautiful and attractive. Imagine that this image would be for publication in a beauty magazine in your home country. I DON’T want you to make changes that you think will please me. Instead ask yourself, ‘what aspects of this portrait must be physically altered in order for it to reflect my standard of beauty.’”

The results ranged from astonishingly unlike the original to mild retouching. “What I’ve learned from this project,” Honig says, “is this: Photoshop [may] allow us to achieve our unobtainable standards of beauty, but when we compare those standards on a global scale, achieving the ideal remains all the more elusive.”

I personally am amazed by how, even in primarily dark-skinned, brown-eyed countries, the results of Honig’s requests were almost all pale-skinned and blue or green-eyed, showing just how Eurocentric many countries’ beauty ideals are. Granted, though, this required minor manipulation on the part of the photoshoppers, as she was already fair-skinned and grey-green eyed.

I was also astounded by just how different even the submissions from the same country looked; so not only is there not really a global standard, there’s also not really a country-wide standard.

What amazed me the most, though, was that the most dramatic changes in the images were not Honig herself (except whatever happened in the American submissions), but the makeup she was wearing. Practically every altered image features make-up to some extent, differing from subtle eye-shadow and slight lip color to bright green eye-shadow and very pink lips. Some countries even clothed Honig; Morocco even had her take hijab (shout-out to the Philippines, though, for giving her a business outfit!). Other countries, notably UK, airbrushed her face to the point that she looks cartoon-drawn. Vietnam didn’t smooth her skin at all, even leaving puffiness under her eyes.

Essentially, the few conclusions that can be drawn from this project are that, although there may not be a universal standard of beauty, certain things most certainly are universally considered beautiful to some extent. All the women retained clear skin and slender features; most had at least hints of makeup and largely light skin.

Honig continues to receive submissions from around the world and then updating them on her website.

The post Photoshopping beauty: An international experiment appeared first on Occasional Planet.

A new bridge across the Mississippi at St. Louis! After years of wrangling and controversy, it was finally happening.  The Mayor proclaimed the bridge to be “an advertisement to the world that St. Louis is determined to move forward with the other great cities of the country.”

Those words could describe the new I-70 bridge under construction over the Mississippi north of downtown, but they were published almost 100 years ago, describing the St. Louis Municipal Bridge, later renamed the MacArthur Bridge. If you’re uncertain as to where the MacArthur Bridge is, it’s just south of the Poplar Street Bridge. It was closed to automobile traffic in 1981. It still carries rail traffic, but it is a rusting hulk of its former grandeur.

From the east, the auto approach departs Piggott Avenue in East St. Louis, soars over streets like Paradise and Victory Avenues and then abruptly ends in mid air seven blocks later. The truncated approach on the west side of the river begins at 7th street and continues across the river, but it is inaccessible to regular traffic.

Beneath the road deck is an active railroad deck, fed by a tangle of approaches that weave a black, industrial web. Mounds of rusting metal chips surround the footings of the bridge. Those chips used to be part of the bridge.

Great structures, designed to nurture future prosperity, often end up like the MacArthur Bridge — grand in their day but now sad, decaying monuments to the past.

Ever wonder what the new I-70 bridge will be like 100 years from now?

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I was perusing an old photo book recently and came across Stanley Forman’s 1977 Pulitzer Prize winning photo of an anti-busing protestor using a flag as a lance to attack a black attorney in Boston. It was a photograph that shook the nation into the realization that segregation was not just a Southern issue.

In his 2008 book, The Soiling of Old Glory: The Story of a Photograph That Shocked America, Louis P. Masur describes the impact of the photograph:

The image served as a harsh reminder that the triumphs of the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s had turned tragic. Progress had been made, but alongside it stood backlash and failure. Americans cherished stories of wrongs righted, of darkness yielding to light, but Forman’s picture provided a poisonous counter-narrative. The brotherhood of man was a worthy ideal, and it even seemed at times that a strong foundation had been laid for its realization. But in a claustrophobic courtyard, a white man turned the American flag against a black man, and the ideal crumbled.

The perception of Boston as a racist city persisted for years. Ironically, it was in Boston in 2004 that Barack Obama addressed the Democratic National Convention with a speech that helped launch him into national attention.

The flag can be a potent weapon of emotional and even irrational behavior. It can also be a quiet reminder of more positive meaning.

This Flag Day, let’s keep things in perspective.

The post Photographer’s notebook: Flag Day perspectives appeared first on Occasional Planet.

I saw a remarkable story on the March 19 CBS Evening News about photo-journalist Steve Liss, who has chronicled poverty in the United States. Liss certainly is not the first to do it; photographers Harvey Bristol and Dorothea Lange documented the plight of migrant farm workers during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Opening our eyes to poverty was important in the early 1960s, when Michael Harrington’s book, The Other America, further awakened John F. Kennedy to the plight of the poor in the U.S.

As I viewed the story on Liss’ photos , I couldn’t help but wonder how it is that so many Republicans apparently are not moved by issues facing the poor in America.

I was thinking about what a conversation about the story between leading Republicans such as Rick Santorum, Mitt Romney, John Boehner, and Eric Cantor might have been like. I can only wonde,r because frankly I’ve never been in a room with conservatives discussing their views on poverty in America.

Would the conversation go something like this?

Person A: Here we go again, the damn liberal media believing the crap about how bad things are for the poor.

Person B: It wouldn’t be so bad if they’d get off their fat asses and get a job.

Person C: People are poor because businesses can’t hire because of high taxes and all the so-called safety and environmental regulations they are forced to live by.

Person D: These damn people take their welfare money and go to the liquor store and then sit around drunk all day.

Person A: I mean it’s true that a lot of these people are poor. But how did they become that way? It’s because they’re so lazy and the government always bails them out.

Person B: Did you see how dirty they looked in the film? They do have soap and running water. What’s wrong with these people; why can’t they get up, take a shower, and put on clean clothes?

Person C: Have you ever talked to one of these people? They show you no respect. And the way they talk; most of the time I don’t even know what language they’re speaking.

Person D: Obama’s going to be speaking about all this stuff we need to do for the unwashed who support him. He’s just trying to foment class warfare. We’ can’t let him and his type fool the American people.

I don’t know how far off base such a conversation would be. Rick Santorum was speaking in Moline, Ill.,  the day before the Illinois primary and said, “I don’t care what the unemployment rate’s’going to be. It doesn’t matter. My campaign doesn’t hinge on unemployment rates and growth rates. There’s something more foundational going on here.” He goes on to explain that the “something foundational” is freedom. So I guess that he finds it acceptable for someone to “enjoy” the freedoms of America even if they don’t have a job or the money with which to purchase the essentials of the family.

I feel most fortunate to (a) not live in poverty, and (b) to have a circle of friends and acquaintances who would be disappointed in America upon seeing Steve Liss’ photos. They feel that America should be committed to eliminating poverty in our society.

Is there something that we’re seeing that conservatives don’t? Or is it the other way around and they have insight that we don’t? I tend to believe that most conservatives merely want to protect their own assets and somehow enhance their egos by looking with disdain upon the poor. If that’s the case, then what a shame it is that some of Steve Liss’ audience is blind to the photos that are a gift from him to our society.

The post Imagining a conservative conversation about poverty appeared first on Occasional Planet.

Times were tough. The country was barely on its way out of a crippling economic disaster. Jobs were scarce. People were hungry and without health care.

Sound familiar? Maybe, but that was the thirties. It was a time when people looked to government to help mend a broken economy. They believed government could play a role helping everyone gain back something that had been lost.

One answer was massive public works projects. Not just drab, utilitarian structures, but spectacular buildings, adorned with art. Architecture that said this country and its government can do big things.

Some of that architecture still exists in the St. Louis area in the form of magnificent old post offices. Ornate marble halls, murals and decorative brasswork all speak to the idea that we’re all part of something bigger than ourselves. These buildings reflected pride. They conveyed a sense that the federal government was there be a part of the community. They provided a glimmer of hope for the future.

It’s ironic that in our time, these grand buildings, symbols of strength and permanency, are part of an entity under severe economic pressure. With the Postal Service considering serious cuts to service, some facilities may be closed.

There is no easy economic answer, but somehow in the 70 years that have passed since those magnificent buildings were constructed, a lot has been lost.

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