Leo Chanel Spoof Final

This piece, I titled Crave is a print piece created for CS Chicago Social magazine. The end result of the piece would include tote bags sold at the Chanel store as part of the spoof but is obviously not possible at the current conditions.

This print ad is a spoof of the Chanel advertisements for their beauty and makeup lines. Chanel No.5 has been one of the most popular items within the Chanel brand for decades but many people don’t realize they have so much more than fragrances. The main subjects of my piece include the transformation of the Chanel bottles and I inserted Chanel pills to add a pop of color to the piece. I kept to a more minimalist style using simple colors and the Chanel logo to try and recreate something accurate within the Chanel branding parameters. This piece could be described as integrative with the repetition of the bottles or it could be described as geometric. Although some of the images are a little messy within the composition, it does not automatically transform the piece into deconstructive. It lies on an unseen underlaying grid with minimal text and background interference.

I work in a world where makeup is a huge appeal to the women I am constantly around. The addictive properties of drugs and cocaine in particular was a good spoof for how much these women apply and talk about cosmetics. I work with lots of models, makeup artists, and other professionals in the field and staying young and energized creates a lot of pressure in our society. Also I think that typical makeup ads usually don’t seem to be about makeup. The size of the beauty industry seems to continually grow as well, “The Professional Beauty Association says the beauty retail industry is on schedule to reach $59 billion in 2012. That’s up from $43 billion in 2006, the last full year before the recession hit. Economists call it “the lipstick effect”: Financially hobbled shoppers may not buy cars or diamonds, but they still indulge in small guilty pleasures — lotions, makeup, hair dyes, gels and cuts, colognes and manicures.” (Chicago Sun Times). They sell the visual appeal using color and great compositions. I messed this composition up a bit to kind of break that mold. Even when the makeup is being used and presented in the ads, a lot of times it is not even the makeup advertised or there are so many other products being used on the model, that it barely even counts. And even further, they produce high fashion and beauty images that are designed to entice the consumer, not show the versatility of the product.

I think the final product was pretty successful especially with the tote bags. It would have been fun to photograph some people wearing the tote bags or even have some people doing a line of Chanel. But I think the message came across, and the more an individual thinks about this and in relation to the size of the beauty industry, a lot more starts to sink in.