Haley by Remi Rebillard in 'La Dolce Vita!!' | The Creatives

Note | Nudity Photographer Remi Rebillard has known a few curvy women in his life and shares La dolce Vita !! with us. The entire editorial is in wide screen images without commentary at Sensuality News.

Looking at these delicious images of Haley with P-models, it’s clear why women like Anita Elberg in ‘La Dolce Vita’ or contemporary women like Kate Winslet and Monica Bellucci are Remi’s references for the shoot. Davide’ Calcinai with www.artist-management.net  did Haley’s hair and makeup.

Monica Bellucci, a woman Remi knew in Paris with Karin, says this about curvy women:

“A curvy woman is not any less beautiful ~ It’s a different type of beauty, and men like it.”

We know Belucci’s observation is valid in the vast majority of male/female relationships but perhaps not so much in today’s aristocracy and definitely not in the fashion industry, where even Vogue Italia editor Franca Sozzani agrees that women have been downsized from the 1990s and the luscious glow of a ripe peach is no longer a sign of beauty.

We’ve lived in this conversation for about two years now, with changes that are minimal to my eye.

An AOC woman reader I only know only as Ellen wrote last week:

I find it interesting that the media increasingly pushes a view of women that goes completely against the rules of attraction: which is one based upon signs of health and usually fertility. The ancient part of the brain is geared to finding a partner who will thrive - and for the majority that includes the ability to conceive or be around long enough to rear children. A skeletal woman with no body fat tells our subconscious that she is unable to fulfill this role: she is most likely unable to conceive (indeed periods stop when you starve yourself) and if she does manage it, the child or the mother is likely to suffer during pregnancy or childbirth. She is unlikely to be able to breastfeed either which is not essential of course but does have benefits for mother and child. I am not talking about naturally thin women, but the size zeros who can only get to that size by depriving themselves of essential calories. Fake boobs can mask this reality to some extent, but the jutting bones will always signify illness.

In a curve ball that was a bit of a knock-out punch for me, Ellen continued, postulating that some feminist women — gay and straight —  have collaborated with designers in desensualizing the 90s supermodels, seeking to promote women as more than fertile baby-makers.

Now that is a new angle in a question that has gone nowhere for months! Ellen has me thinking.

The $64,000 Question

In a blog post on My Body, My Image, writer Theresa Ruth Howard responded to Andrej Pejic’s recent Push Up Bra ad by saying:

” … I have no problem with androgyny when is comes to the way a person chooses to live, art, or a fashion shoot. But I WILL be DAMNED if a man dressed as a woman is going to sell me a PUSH UP BRA! (Bold from author) You have to draw the line somewhere! … Personally, this for me has gone too far, especially when we bring in the discussion about body image, and the media-created aesthetic of the female body and beauty.

As a woman looking at this (Andrej Pejic bra ad), what is it that I am supposed to feel? Are we that replaceable? (Bold from Anne)

Well: Are We That Replaceable?

My recent article ‘Self Love is Saying ‘No’ to Fashion Images You Hate’ is drawing big reads. I personally said “no” to two images that have absolutely no sensual appeal to me in that article and encouraged other women to embrace their own visions of beauty, too.

This afternoon I went to release an editorial over on Sensuality News, reviewing a model who will remain nameless and was nude in much of the editorial. Following on Ellen’s comment about breasts as signs of fertility, let me say that this woman’s were slightly larger than Andrej Pejic’s referenced above.

After accusing myself of being biased in favor of juicy fruit women like Haley, I jettisoned the unmentionable editorial of a model whose entire skeleton was exposed in her fashionable images. I couldn’t answer my own questions of why I thought the editorial belonged on our websites which emphasize female sensuality. Besides, the model has good exposure on a couple high fashion blogs and doesn’t need my coverage.

So let me stay true to principles that are hardening some, as we count down to 2012. 

When the beautiful Haley below is the curvy woman who needs to be ‘explained’ somehow for her obvious ancestral but iconic physical attributes — the freckles, I mean — the question “Are we that replaceable?” rings in my ears. 

I’ll take the Haleys and Monica Bellucci’s any day of the week. And I love Ines de la Fressange, too, which demosnstrates the wide range of my own beauty preferences. Personally, I don’t have a bias against ultra thin women at all, when they are toned and in shape. God created many visions of beautiful women and the vast majority of them have curves of various shapes and sizes. It’s the professionals who can’t cope with curves.

I hope that the seriousness of my writing doesn’t mask the breath and depth of visual interest in Remi’s images. He asked for words but didn’t know what I would write. 

We’ll post La Dolce Vita !! over on Sensuality News in their full 1000 ppi width for better appreciation. It’s infintely superior over the big magazine editorial I pitched mid-afternoon.

These Italian-inspired Boticelli women project eternal grace, intelligence and sensuality, and a vision of femaleness that has stayed the test of time. Until the day the misogynists really win the gender game — which could come with technological advancements in robotics and reproduction — ripe peaches in many shapes and sizes rule on our websites.

Remi has captured all these influences and womanly questions in an important set of images focused on being female in the 21st century fashion industry.  Anne

More Remi Rebillard editorials and website.

Comments

[Ken Moody]

No...you are NOT replaceable!!! The men I know, young and old, see absolutely no beauty in the ultra-thins that starve themselves to standards that are completely unnatural. Do we like attractive and sensual and sexy??? Yes, but we also realize it comes in many sizes and attitudes. As women think about the hunk they want to bed, they know they are not the guy they want to marry and raise a family with or have a stable relationship with. Men are no different in that there are the really sexy/sensual women that we drool over as voyeurs, but we know that realistically, the woman we want to be loyal and by our side is not the same as the former. So, we live in a true dichotomy of values and we are all different. Funny, but the only one that doesn't fit in, is the super thin waif required by the designer to endanger her life!