Crys Leung

Department: Man and Communication
Website: www.unicorn-tv.com

Confident Face-Swap

What: A hacked version of Vogue, based on the portrayal of beauty in the past 50 years of the magazine.

Why: Advertising in this famous fashion magazine is saturated with a certain beauty standard, captured in idyllic images. But what does such visual perfection convey to ordinary readers?

How: Trends come and go, but, as five decades of Vogue advertising reveal, one quality never goes out of fashion: confidence. Mimicking this trait, Crys Leung photoshopped her own face into the original images to reveal and understand the tools that magazines use to manipulate the reader. It’s about making them buy into a parallel world, where there is no insecurity or sadness.

“Is it me, or the industry that’s going nuts?”