Equality, Cosmo, and Pinnacle Imitation Whipped Cream Flavored Vodka

The message that seems to be put forth in the ad for Pinnacle Vodka is, if you buy your husband or boyfriend Pinnacle imitation whipped cream flavored vodka he will be whipped and submissive to you, which results in him doing the housework. Upon viewing this ad I immediately became defensive and irritated. There was such inequality of labor division in this relationship that the woman had to bribe the man with vodka to get him to do housework. This indicates that housework is out of the norm for the man.
I found this advertisement in the middle of the December 2012 issue of Cosmopolitan. Pinnacle Vodka wanted to create an advertisement that appealed to the readers of Cosmopolitan. The Cosmo website identifies their readers as women who are sexually liberated and independent. The Cosmo woman knows she is as competent and intelligent as her male counterparts; she can achieve and have everything. As with most advertising and media today, Cosmopolitan and Pinnacle Vodka promote heteronormativity (promotes heterosexuality as the preferred and normal sexual orientation) and refuse to even acknowledge homosexual relationships.
I subverted the image to have the man sitting on the couch while the woman vacuums. The image represents an undesirable distribution of power in a relationship. The use of the word whipped now takes on a dominant/submissive connotation, which does not fit with the ideal Cosmo woman. If changing the gender roles in the image makes it undesirable for advertising, what does that say about the realities of our equality?

sisters

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This collage made with Smilebox

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This free picture collage made with Smilebox

The auto tag function on Facebook is convinced my sister and I are the same person. Every photo my sister has posted in the past six months has been automatically tagged as me. Facebook is so assured of my sister’s “identity” it doesn’t even ask if it’s her. The best part about this is that my sister and I don’t look alike in person. Our parents dressed us alike when we were young, but we were never mistaken for twins. This hasn’t stopped teachers over the years from confusing us but I always assumed that was due to inherent sibling similarities, not physical looks. For this project I attempted to determine why facebook would be confusing us.

As I looked at the photos I felt the feeling of punctum as described by Annette Kuhn. The way my sister and I posed and took photos was strikingly similar. The way we interact with our boyfriends, pose in travel photos, and even our candid smiles demonstrated our deeper link.

Documentary

I live by the University of Arizona Stadium so I got to watch the construction of the new scoreboard and the light from the giant A shines into my room at night. I, like many people, complained about the new scoreboard; it's an unnecessary cost for an already tight school budget. However, after the A was assembled and lit up I started to understand that the new scoreboard was part of the Arizona brand. This brand is seen everywhere on campus, on students and buildings alike. The Arizona A serves as a symbol to unify Tucson and the University.

Texture

Even basic bikes are composed of many different materials. The background also provided a roughness in contrast to the smoothness of the bike. The photo of the seat contrasts the softness of the leather with the sharpness of the metal. The texture on the front stem really caught my eye, it's designed to look like it's raised but it's flat. 

Balance

For this project I decided to focus on balance. Balance in a photograph is the use multiple points of focus and the use of the entire frame. I used a bike as my subject, which was fitting with the study of balance because biking requires multiple focuses and the use of all parts of a bicycle. For this project I looked at parts of the bike that work together. I did this through the use of foreground and background as well as the rule of thirds.

Perspectives