Earlier this week, Paper Magazine published an article featuring Kim Kardashain, a woman who has become famous for being famous, completely nude. The article was titled, conveniently, Break the Internet, and has unironically showed up in everyone’s Facebook feed ever since.
Today, Paper released one of the unedited photos from Kardashian’s shoot, much to the chagrin of both the star, and the photographer.
“I took the photos at the right angle and with the best lighting possible to really make Kim shine,” said photographer Gett N. Noshous. “Unfortunately, not even the best photographer in the world could get it right in the studio every single time, especially with what we were working with this time around, so we had to do some touch-ups in Photoshop. It’s a fairly common thing these days, whether it be for print of a mega publication, or even someone’s Facebook profile. Though as a professional, I really hate it when the untouched photos make it to the public view.”
“I look just dreadful. Truly, dreadful,” said Kardashian. “The photos that they published, they were perfect. I’ve never been ashamed of my body, but when I saw the original, unedited photos, it made me wonder what Kanye would even want with me. I don’t want that to be my public persona.”
“Personally, I have no problems with the original images getting out there,” said Charles Gerd, the photo editor hired to make the pictures more appealing. “I mean, all that really does for me is get me more work. The better job we do making someone look beautiful, the better my paychecks look.”
“I think the retouching goes too far these days,” said the editor of a major U.S. fashion magazine, who spoke under anonymity. “We pay photographers thousands to get the shots we want, and then we pay graphic designers thousands more to take those shots and make them more perfect. But who is to say what’s perfect? Why is one body better than another? Why is okay for Kim Kardashian’s ass to appear on the cover of a magazine and all over social media, but it’s not okay for a woman to breast feed in public? Why is it not okay to wear a two-piece bikini at the beach unless you’re a size zero? Breast feeding is natural. Having curves and being okay with that is natural. Kim’s bare butt on the cover of a magazine? Well, it’s not natural.”
What do you think? Would you rather see original, unedited images published in magazines, or do you think retouching and Photoshopping images is okay? Sound off in the comments!