Music Video Reveals What it Really Takes to Look Like a Pop Star
So it’s pretty much a given by now that any public image of a model, actor, or pop star has been digitally altered. But it doesn’t make peeking under the hood to see exactly what gets slimmed, smoothed, doctored, and deleted any less mind-blowing, especially when it’s the latest striking example, this one of Hungarian singer Boggie.
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In her official music video for a song called “Nouveau Parfum,” we see her in close-up while she sings — and, for the entire three and a half minutes, has her face and hair fixed up, thanks to a software program. Blemishes get erased, skin tone gets lightened, bra straps are banished, hair gets recolored and styled, and eyes and lips are bedazzled. It’s all pretty cool and mesmerizing — unless, of course, you stop and think about the fact that a perfectly beautiful woman is being transformed into yet another unrealistically glossy gal who can help feed the plummeting self-esteem of ladies everywhere.
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“It would be wonderful if all women would be able to love their own faces without makeup, so you could see the natural beauty of real strength,” Boggie told the Hungarian publication Recorder when the video debuted in December.
It’s just the latest in an ever-expanding lineup of digital-alteration exhibits. In October, a 36-second video of a blond woman being “fixed” beyond recognition went viral. And earlier this month, a Vogue cover of Lena Dunham created a major hubbub — and a $10,000 reward from Jezebel — over what’s real, unfair, cleaned-up, and expected in glossy magazines.
Dunham added to the conversation by playing down the whole affair. "A fashion magazine is like a beautiful fantasy,” she told Slate France. “Vogue isn't the place that we go to look at realistic women, Vogue is the place that we go to look at beautiful clothes and fancy places and escapism, and so I feel like if the story reflects me and I happen to be wearing a beautiful Prada dress and surrounded by beautiful men and dogs, what’s the problem? If they want to see what I really look like go watch the show that I make every single week."
And if you want to see what Boggie really looks like? You'll have to stick with the first 19 seconds of her video.
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