Eleventh International Conference on The Image

Abstract

Posing in front of the camera, known as (hobby) modelling, is an activity that focuses on the surface—it is “superficial.” Thus it seems to be obvious that modelling must have a rather negative influence on the individual’s psyche. Although it might be able to boost the self-esteem in the short run, it cannot fill an inner emptiness and inevitably, as beauty declines, has to result in disappointment and a loss of the built-up self-esteem. However, a long-term participant observation, surveys, and interviews in the scene of (hobby) model photography in the German-speaking area, where the research was conducted, proved the opposite: models report that this activity makes them feel better. How is this possible? First, modelling helps to train important skills such as the verbalization and rationalization of inner states, creativity understood as the ability to cope with reality’s deficiencies, and the presentation of the self. It provides cultural insights, especially when staging new topics. Further, it is closely connected to identity. Models find a “protected terrain” in which they can act out character traits they usually hide or in which they can try new identities. Moreover, it offers a very concrete identity as a model that is not constituted by a particular look, but by a multitude of looks. It might sound counter-intuitive, but modelling can even surpass the body as the images often can be rather understood as symbols than as indexes.