Oh my head!
Aug. 16th, 2009 12:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
megwritesIs there a rule somewhere that says the women in SF/F cover art must look like they're just copypasta of fashion models, except with bigger boobs?
I went surfing around a few of the sites of artists who do the covers for SF/F books and I swear I've seen some of those women in the advertisements and fashion shoots for Vogue or Vanity Fair or something like that. One picture - which I shall not link here - featured a model with slicked back hair standing behind something and I realized that I'd seen nearly that exact same pose, model, and body type in an advertisement for body wash.
Somebody really needs to do something about SF/F cover art's representations of women. Like, right now. Because no matter how revolutionary the text, if we (the larger we) are still representing it using old, harmful standards of beauty when it comes to women and people of color, we're taking two steps forward and two steps back.
Which, if you do the math, leaves us exactly where we started. And I'd really, really like to be somewhere different than where SF/F is right now. Somewhere that has less tramp stamps and improbably tight fitting leather (seriously? How do you fight demons and vampires wearing that stuff? And how do you not sound like a walking fart machine when it starts squeaking? God, the chafing must be unreal!) on the cover of urban fantasy novels.
Just once, I'd like to see a cover which features a model wearing practical shoes. High heels are great for cocktail parties, but when it comes to fighting off the monstrous undead, I recommend a solid pair of Nikes. Because otherwise you're going to fracture your ankle during a battle and get eaten. And I will not feel sorry for you because anyone who tries to fight a vampire while wearing a pair Manolo Blahniks is sealing their own fate.
I went surfing around a few of the sites of artists who do the covers for SF/F books and I swear I've seen some of those women in the advertisements and fashion shoots for Vogue or Vanity Fair or something like that. One picture - which I shall not link here - featured a model with slicked back hair standing behind something and I realized that I'd seen nearly that exact same pose, model, and body type in an advertisement for body wash.
Somebody really needs to do something about SF/F cover art's representations of women. Like, right now. Because no matter how revolutionary the text, if we (the larger we) are still representing it using old, harmful standards of beauty when it comes to women and people of color, we're taking two steps forward and two steps back.
Which, if you do the math, leaves us exactly where we started. And I'd really, really like to be somewhere different than where SF/F is right now. Somewhere that has less tramp stamps and improbably tight fitting leather (seriously? How do you fight demons and vampires wearing that stuff? And how do you not sound like a walking fart machine when it starts squeaking? God, the chafing must be unreal!) on the cover of urban fantasy novels.
Just once, I'd like to see a cover which features a model wearing practical shoes. High heels are great for cocktail parties, but when it comes to fighting off the monstrous undead, I recommend a solid pair of Nikes. Because otherwise you're going to fracture your ankle during a battle and get eaten. And I will not feel sorry for you because anyone who tries to fight a vampire while wearing a pair Manolo Blahniks is sealing their own fate.
no subject
Date: 2009-08-17 02:35 pm (UTC)I did some freelance work for the RPG company Iron Crown Enterprises back in the 1980s, and at one point they got famed historical arms & armor illustrator Angus McBride to do covers for their main rules book series. He created a core adventurer group that appeared in different scenes on the various covers. One of them appears to be a female ranger, and the only flesh she's flashing is a pair of moderately sturdy legs (her tunic is slit fairly high up). Also, she has short hair. See here and here.
But for the most part, yes - leather and/or chainmail bikinis. And female characters looking helpless even when they're not looking sexy; see here where P.C. Hodgell is taking issue with the cover for the one-volume combined reissue of vols. 3 and 4 of her Chronicles of the Kencyrath.