The Japan Diaries, by Formento and Formento: photography

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@Nelsie

Whether this is to do with fin de siecle Orientalism, perhaps, or if it goes back further, I don’t know, but it may be that enough time has passed for this fashion to be its own thing rather than a conscious reference to Asians or Western ideas of Asians.

If the makeup was operating in isolation, perhaps I would be more sympathetic. But it’s not. I mean, you have makeup + kimono + katana/squid/ofuro/masks/etc. In that context I don’t think you can use this kind of exaggerated makeup and pretend that you aren’t making any nod to Orientalism.

@Nelsie

does it actually have anything to do with fetishizing Asians, rather than fetishization being a feature of Western photography? Does a woman stripping from her kimono to a bikini on a street corner in a Japanese city uniquely signify anything that, say, a Western woman stripping from a ball-gown on a street corner in Los Angeles doesn’t?

The images aren’t purely sexual. Some depict praying at a shrine, some depict laying in a capsule-like bed, and others depict licking a katana. The fetish is Japan, not bondage or sex. Can you look at the image below and honestly say that, in the overall context of the photo, that you think there is no fetishization of Japan going on and that the it’s only a coincidence that the (supposedly Western-style) makeup is also accentuating the slanted eyes?

Absolutely there’s a difference. You mess up representations of your own culture and you will be called out on it (if your target audience is your own culture), as Calvin Klein repeatedly has been over their ad campaigns.

If a Japanese fashion magazine misrepresented US culture to Japanese by portraying the US as a nation of blue-eyed blonde bombshells who are kinky as shit and of loose morals, this should also be objectionable (as I’m sure blondes who spend time in Japan might know) even if there isn’t a core group of blue-eyed blonde bombshells in the US campaigning against this Japanese magazine.

@Nelsie

The location changes the meaning of the photo in the viewer’s mind, undoubtably, but that meaning depends on the viewer to a large extent: we take away from the photo what we bring to it, more than what the photographer puts there. A kimono will mean a different thing to a Tokyo-ite than it does to me, and the act of taking one off in somewhat surreal circumstances will mean something different to each of us

I’ve acknowledged that the meaning and impact changes with the audience, and the fact that this is aimed at Western audiences is what makes it problematic. And while different people may interpret things differently, I’m not sure how this is an excuse: different people interpret the Redskins name differently, and arguing that the meaning of these images is fundamentally malleable would seem to deny that “artists” such as the Formentos are able to have (or claim they have) an artistic message or agenda that they want to (or even can) convey.

And does your perception of the photo, as a member of the audience, potentially matter more than the perception of the model? Absolutely. If it didn’t could anyone argue that Hooters is demeaning when people choose to work there? Or that a extreme pornographic film is obscene when the models enjoy what they’re doing? Or that Carl’s Jr. ads are exploitative?

@Nelsie

If you want others to understand and empathise with your offence, though, it helps if you can bring something to the discussion other than the mere fact of your offence and distracting irrelevancies such as Sharia and the Washington Redskins.

Every time I’ve discussed Sharia and the Redskins (including above) it has been in the context of who has the right to object, and the validity of their objections. You don’t have to be a woman to object to perceived sexism (and sexism in fashion photography). You don’t have to be Indian to object to Washington’s team name. You don’t have to be Muslim or female to object to Sharia. Why do you have to be Japanese to object to this?

@Nelsie

Finally, it seems an odd thing to this pale white Brit with Gaelic-Celtic-Pict-Roman-Angle-Saxon-Norman-other ancestry for a half-Asian to comment on the degree of Asian-ness of the models in this shoot, almost as though there’s something… wrong with being Asian and having a feature or two that does not conform to “traditional” patterns. Surely this should be a phenomenon you are familiar with and reconciled to.

There’s nothing wrong with having blended features, but the reality is that not many Japanese do (and given the discrimination against “halfs” in Japan, a campaign celebrating blended features aimed at a Japanese audience would make more sense than a photographs using blended features aimed at a foreign audience in a project celebrating some dress-up version of traditional Japanese culture). And if you’re going to make Japanese culture the focus of your art, it’s probably not a terrible idea to have models that look Japanese. If you’re going to make a Western movie or a period movie set in the Middle East, it’s probably a good idea to have Indian actors play Indians and locals play the Middle Easterners, rather than slathering makeup on people with non-traditional features, even if it’s true that many Indians and Middle Easterners today do have non-traditional features.

@andy_hilmer

Reply with something on topic, and I might respond with something in kind. Right now it’s pretty clear you are just griefing, so I reply to the griefing. Grief on, trolley.

Hey, you’re the one who has been posting nothing but grief, while refusing to actually engage—or even read—the substantive points I’ve made. If you just want to continue to post a stream of off-topic insults you’re welcome to do so, but don’t pretend you’re occupying some moral high ground.