Beauty – is it in the eye of the beholder?
Beautiful models, pretty models, handsome models… all the adjectives so often applied to models. Pretty females and handsome males that appear to define beauty and attract admiration from around the world. Beautiful models are icons, inspirational to millions, setting the look, style and standard just as figures throughout history were admired for their beauty.
Kate Moss, Gisele Bundchen, Claudia Schiffer, Naomi Campbell, Carolyn Murphy, Natalia Vodianova, Sean O’Pry, Matt Gordon, David Gandy, and Danny Schwartz… latter day heroes and heroines that define the meaning of pretty and handsome: Cleopatra, Helen of Troy, Audrey Hepburn, Achilles, Clark Gable, James Dean…
Beauty comes in so many different shapes and sizes, colours and styles. What one photographer, designer or magazine reader perceives as the epitome of a beautiful model or a handsome model can leave another untouched. Designer Vivienne Westwood once even went as far as to say that models were monsters. Beauty is so enigmatic and so compelling that it can be unfathomable in its magnetism and almost terrifying.
Let’s face it, so many lives and quests are driven by a love of beauty – it has become the engine for writers, painters, musicians, and photographers the world over. As indescribable as it is in essence, the impact of a beautiful or handsome face on a heart is undisputable. Would Peter the Great have created St Petersburg for Catherine if he thought she “had a nice personality”? Would Romeo have risked his life for Juliet if he hadn’t been astounded and rendered sleepless by the image of her face?
Beauty is, if nothing else, multi-faceted and many-layered. A twinkle in the eye that reveals a shimmering spirit, a flick of the hair that reveals a playful soul. Beauty is as much about how we look as what we look like, and the world’s beautiful models learn how to say so much with a simple expression.
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