Vanity Fair & Dansk | Eve & Lilith

Might we be seeing an Amazonian kick in the butt to imagery like the current cover of Vanity Fair magazine? I wouldn’t call the response a ‘backlash’ but rather an ‘aha’ moment.  Like the aristocratic imagery in Ralph Lauren’s spring 2010 menswear campaign, the Vanity Fair cover celebrates the etheral beauty of very thin, Caucasian starlets who sign the prenup without asking any questions.

These girls aren’t ‘dames’, they are ‘damsels’ … girls in need of a helping hand, a lift up into stardom as symbols of Wall Street under duress but laughing all the way to the bank. The cover of Vanity Fair is a high-five to old money and the assumption that every good American aspires to live the high life.

It wasn’t the cover of DANSK Magazine, on newsstands Feb. 11, 2010 that caught my eye.  Rather the Daily Mail photos of 46-year-old Amazonian Queen Brigitte Nielsen really got my attention, especially in the ongoing body image debate.

Nielsen’s figure gives Karl Lagerfeld heartburn. She’s so strong, so voluptuous and overtly sensual, so able to kick ass.  Today’s economiic reality is that women are increasingly the primary breadwinners with major responsibilities as women of every financial model, social status and relationship type.

Brigitte Nielsen is an unsettling power house image, a woman of imaginations with much more in common with the great Supermodels than today’s emaciated crew on wobbly legs.

Are women (and men) hunting for new imagery? In today’s world, one hopes so, but reality is that we’ve been through cycles before in America. The true fundamentals of feminism escape millions of American women because of our religiosity.

Globally, the ascendancy of Scandinavian women — probably the most economically, politically and sensually liberated women on the planet — is impacting fashion and the sisterhood worldwide.

Brigette Nielsen for Dansk, Spring 2010Nielsen stands in the grand tradition of Lilith, Adam’s first wife in the Garden of Eden and his equal. When Adam insisted that she lay under him, Lilith said ‘no’ and stormed out of Eden. That’s what I’m trying to say this morning: the Vanity Fair girls are Eve and Nielsen is Lilith.

Anyone who knows the story of Lilith understands that in biblical traditions, Lilith is the patriarchy’s worst nightmare and also the woman of their private dreams.

Why do you think so many men on Wall Street end up in sex dungeons paying for their sins? There’s no redemption with angels in floaty dresses, when you’re a bad-ass captain of the universe.  Anne