Farrah Fawcett in a red swimsuit

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Farrah Fawcett in a red swimsuit
Bruce McBroom , 1976

Link to the picture
(please note copyrights )

The photo of Farrah Fawcett in a red bathing suit was taken in 1976 by photographer Bruce McBroom. It was commissioned by Pro Arts, which brought it out as a pin-up poster that same year . The picture became a huge success and is considered the best-selling poster to date, with more than twelve million copies sold. It is considered a modern icon and a symbol of the late 1970s.

description

In the photo you can see the American actress Farrah Fawcett, who is wearing a bathing suit . Its color is usually described as red, more rarely as reddish orange. Fawcett is seated with her body facing to the right, slightly turned toward the viewer. She has bent her left leg and only her thigh and the upper part of the lower leg can be seen. Your right leg is stretched out, but only parts of the thigh can be seen. She bent her left arm. Her upper arm lies on her left knee, and she grabs her hair with one hand. The right arm is stretched back slightly, the lower part of the forearm cannot be seen. She tipped her head slightly back and turned towards the viewer. She put on a big smile that shows both rows of very white teeth. Your eyes look at the viewer. Her hair is curly and darker than her natural, blonde hair color. The swimsuit shows a clear cleavage and both nipples can be seen under the fabric . A striped blanket can be seen in the background of the photo.

Creation and publication

The photo was taken in the summer of 1976 as a commission for the poster company Pro Arts. According to Ted Trikilis, who ran the company with his brother and uncle, a friend introduced him to Farrah Fawcett, who was then quite unknown, in April 1976. Meanwhile, fellow students would the actress, who then advertise shampoo made, US television deem the most beautiful woman in, but would have to cut Shampoo advertising from newspapers and hang on the wall in the absence of posters of her. Pro Arts signed a contract with Fawcett, which allowed them to control the selection of photos. After being dissatisfied with the work of two photographers, she suggested Bruce McBroom as a photographer, with whom she had previously worked. The photo was taken on the Los Angeles estate that Fawcett shared with her partner Lee Majors . The swimsuit, a creation by designer Norma Kamali , belonged to Fawcett, who also styled it herself. The blanket in the background of the photo belonged to McBroom, who usually used it to cover the seats of his car. From the photos McBroom took that day, Fawcett picked two favorites, including the one later published as a poster.

The poster was a huge hit. Six million units were sold in the first year. With a total of more than twelve million copies sold, it is considered the best-selling poster to date.

analysis

In 2003, the communication scientist Chadwick Roberts published an essay in which he dealt, among other things, with the photo of Fawcett in a bathing suit and its significance with regard to social developments in the United States. On the one hand, he sees it as a sign of a change in the female ideal of beauty. Fawcett's luscious hair shows a departure from the androgynous style of the late 1960s and early 1970s. There are also clear differences in comparison to the pin-up photos from the 1940s. At that time, women mostly had lush breasts and hips, whereas Fawcett's hips are narrow and her breasts are rather small. While the women on the pin-ups of the 1940s mostly had snub noses, Fawcett's nose is thin and distinctive. Overall, compared to Mae West and Marilyn Monroe, for example, Fawcett shows a significantly less sexualized kind of sexiness and embodies femininity without degenerating into a parody of it. This represents a new form of the All-American Girl , the girl next door. The showing of the nipples and the inner part of the thigh, which was still avoided in the 1940s, indicates a change in moral ideas in the United States down.

Fawcett also clearly differs from Marilyn Monroe in how photography was created. She shows that Fawcett wanted to keep control of her own image, while the appearance and image of Monroe including her name was made by men.

Aftermath

The poster with Fawcett's photo can be seen in the 1977 film Saturday Night Fever . It hangs in the room of the protagonist Tony Manero, played by John Travolta , next to a picture of Al Pacino . The 1997 film Boogie Nights, set in the 1970s, also shows the poster.

In 2011, toy maker Mattel brought out a Barbie collectible doll that recreates the photography scene. In the same year, the Fawcetts family donated several items from the estate of the actress, who died in 2009, to the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History . This included a copy of the poster and a puzzle that shows the photo, as well as the swimsuit Fawcett had been wearing in the photo. The pieces have since been exhibited in the Museum's Culture and Fine Arts Department.

The poster has been the subject of several legal proceedings. Pro Arts sued Campus Craft Holdings, a Canadian company that distributed over 90,000 copies of the poster in Canada without permission. In 1980, an Ontario campus court sentenced Craft Holdings to a fine of over $ 270,000. The company withdrew its appeal after paying a lesser fine. However , Pro Arts failed with a lawsuit against Hustler in a US court. An advertisement had appeared in the men's magazine with Farrah Fawcett's poster in the background. The court rated the use as fair use , as the overall size and proportion of the poster in the advertisement was only small and Pro Arts had not suffered any damage as a result of the use.

literature

  • Chadwick Roberts: The Politics of Farrah's Body: The Female Icon as Cultural Embodiment . In: The Journal of Popular Culture . tape 37 , no. 1 , 2003, p. 83-104 , doi : 10.1111 / 1540-5931.00055 (English).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Chadwick Roberts: The Politics of Farrah's Body: The Female Icon as Cultural Embodiment. 2003, p. 88.
  2. ↑ a b Cynthia Gorney: King of The Posters . In: The Washington Post . January 25, 1979 (English, washingtonpost.com ).
  3. ↑ Colleen Kratofil: Designer Norma Kamali Wasn't a Fan of Farrah Fawcett's Iconic Red Swimsuit - and She Created It! In: People . March 2, 2017, accessed September 2, 2019 .
  4. ↑ Bruce McBroom: Fawcett Photographer Recalls an Iconic Shoot. In: Time . June 25, 2009, accessed September 2, 2019 .
  5. ↑ Lisa Respers France: Fawcett 'last of the iconic pinup girls'. In: CNN . June 30, 2009, accessed September 2, 2019 .
  6. ↑ Chadwick Roberts: The Politics of Farrah's Body: The Female Icon as Cultural Embodiment. 2003, pp. 85-87.
  7. ^ A b Chadwick Roberts: The Politics of Farrah's Body: The Female Icon as Cultural Embodiment. 2003, p. 87.
  8. ↑ Lucille Barilla: The Real Story Behind Farrah Fawcett's Iconic Swimsuit Poster. In: Inquisitr. May 23, 2019, accessed on September 2, 2019 .
  9. ↑ Paul Jordan: Farrah Fawcett Immortalized as a Barbie Doll. In: People. July 29, 2011, accessed September 2, 2019 .
  10. ↑ Smithsonian Collects Objects from Farrah Fawcett's Career. In: National Museum of American History website. February 1, 2011, accessed September 2, 2019 .
  11. ^ Margaret Ferguson: Pro Arts, Inc. v. Campus Craft Holdings Ltd. In: Resource News . tape 6 , no. 3 , December 1981, pp. 10–12 (English, heinonline.org ).
  12. ↑ Lee S. Brenner, Allison S. Rohrer: The De Minimis Doctrine: How Much Copying Is Too Much? In: Communications Lawyer . tape 24 , no. 1 , 2006, p. 9–15 , here: 11–12 (English, heinonline.org ).