DYSMORPHIA
According to the internet, “Body Dysmorphic disorder is a mental disorder characterized by the obsessive idea that some aspect of one’s own appearance is severely flawed and warrants exceptional measures to hide or fix it.”
Body Dysmorphic Disorder has so many ways it effects the victim. Somebody with Body Dysmorphia would think about their “real or perceived” flaws for hours each day. They can’t control their negative thoughts and don’t believe people who tell them that they look fine. Their thoughts may cause severe emotional distress and interfere with their daily functioning. They may miss work or school, avoid social situations and isolate themselves, even from family and friends, because they fear others will notice their flaws.
BDD is a body-image disorder characterized by persistent and intrusive preoccupations with an imagined or slight defect in one’s appearance. People with BDD can dislike any part of their body, although they often find fault with their hair, skin, nose, chest, or stomach. In reality, a perceived defect may be only a slight imperfection or nonexistent. But for someone with BDD, the flaw is significant and prominent, often causing severe emotional distress and difficulties in daily functioning.The causes of BDD are unclear, but certain biological and environmental factors may contribute to its development, including genetic predisposition, neurobiological factors such as malfunctioning of serotonin in the brain, personality traits, and life experiences (e.g. child maltreatment, sexual trauma, peer-abuse).
Body Dysmophia is a big issue, especially in teenage’s and young adults. Social media and the creation of the ‘ideal’ body image has effected the development of body dysmorphia. I want to use this social issue and process it so that I can express the concern through the use of photography. A creation of a ‘body suite’ could be used to represent what it could look like, in a symbolized way, to live with body dysmorphia. I would create a series of body suites using different materials, such as tights. A model would then wear the suites in a series of shoots to experiment which angles and positions are the best to highlight the context of the suites.
The images below are ideas of different body suites I could try recreate. I want to capture some images of the full body and some of just the face and other specific body parts.
I like the effect of the plain, simple background. I’ll use this idea in my shoot. The colour pallets have clearly been well planned. The fleshy tones with the browns and the pinks work really well, but I also like the bright colors in contrast to the dark background.