The process of objectification — to take a living, complex 3-dimensional person and render them into two-dimensions – is a significant part of modern communication. Advertising and television helping to constitute our very desires. Reflecting on previous invitations of objectification can help us to understand how we are being organized.
Fray magazine has twenty images of playboy playmate lips juxtaposed with the causes of their deaths. The artist is Jennifer Daniel.
There are some obvious problems with this project. Using previously objectified people runs the risk that the reader will simply re-create the old pattern of knowledge. But something about this obscuring of the sexy bodies and the bringing forward of the deaths gets at the realness of humans who have been pushed aside for their body images.
For instance Miss November 1969 who’s turnoffs include: “people who are always late,” dies in an auto accident. Was she rushing to an appointment? Was she killed by someone drunk driving? Was she driving?
I find the piece sad and lonely. Perhaps in that way it can be a restorative to help respond to the relentless pressures of bodily discipline.
Life of refinement 