Beauty
Beauty is our purest form; our face, shape, and attributes from the day we are born. It is an immeasurable phenomenon that no one person can define but has been forced to fit in a box scarce of rarity. Beauty was appreciated in a completely different fashion in the past, yet that same beauty is unrecognizable today. It is not keeping your head down and fitting into a mold others have screamed at you to fit in. Beauty is raw, exposed, and imperfect.
Frida Kahlo rebelled against the harsh ideals of femininity and presented herself proudly through self-portraits.
To start, during the Renaissance, women were considered beautiful if they had curvaceous bodies. In contrast to today, this body type is seen as a ‘downgrade’ in women, no matter their age. Women were considered more than perfect during this time because plumper bodies meant they were well fed and had an abundance of food, which was hard to come by. Additionally, women with this body shape were viewed as royalty and difficult to attract. Moreover, high foreheads, thin eyebrows, and pale skin were all seen as characteristics of beauty. In contrast, skinnier women were also seen as beautiful. Instead of royalty, they were seen as graceful and delicate, but still just as beautiful. All in all, there was no forced sense of beauty. Somewhere along the line, this definition of beauty took a complete turn. Today's standards of beauty are limited to skinny and conforming women who, generally, do not have any unique characteristics. Rare attributes of a woman's physical appearance have been stigmatized to be hated so badly that it’s forced plastic surgery to be the most up-and-coming field of surgery. Features that used to be appreciated, like hooked noses, beauty marks, thin eyebrows, thin lips, and pale skin all have countermeasures to erase in this age. Microblading eyebrows, rhinoplasties, and tattooed makeup are all popular ways to correct these ‘imperfections’. Society has been so wrapped up in fixing the small things that make us different, we’ve all forgotten our sense of self.
Even though definitions of beauty continue to evolve, whiteness (fairness) has persisted to be the universal standard of beauty..
‘Beauty; a combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially the sight.’ (Oxford Languages) By the definition of an affirmed dictionary, beauty is defined by the view of others, not from within. Beauty is our purest self; the way we present ourselves without hesitance. Beauty isn’t shaming others for how they look or shaming ourselves for things we can not help. Beauty can be button noses and blue eyes, but it doesn’t take away the beauty of Grecian slopes and solid-colored irises. Beauty can be smooth and beauty can be dimpled. Beauty is an unapologetic storm that breaks out of every glass box it's forced in. Beauty can’t be defined, it is simply who we are.
The Birth of Venus is one of the most famous examples of old beauty standards. The painting depicts goddess Aphrodite with a womanly and rounded body shape.
Unbothered, powerful, raw, pure, genuine, and real are all synonyms of beauty. Perfection and generality aren’t. Everyone has a different definition of perfection, which makes it impossible for anyone to be close to it. So, labeling one body shape or face as perfect, causes everyone else to mold themselves to fit that standard as painfully as possible. If the standard is blonde, am I supposed to break my black hair so I’m better accepted? If the standard is skinny, am I supposed to change the way I eat so more people will think I’m pretty? The real question is, where do we draw the line?
‘There is no definition of beauty, but when you can see someone's spirit coming through, something unexplainable, that's beautiful to me.’ (Liv Tyler) Today’s examples of beauty have ruined young girls’ chances of finding their individuality. In the past, beauty was seen as someone’s personality, but ever since we’ve entered the 21st century, all we can notice about each other is what can be fixed.
