Blackface Model Controversy in Numero Magazine

Link: Magazine sorry for model in blackface

I came across this video on the main page of CNN’s website today titled “Magazine sorry for model with blackface”. The video, linked above, talks about a recent spread in the French magazine Numero which depicts a white model in what appears to be blackface with the text “African Queen” next to her picture.

The reporters dialogue and the statements from both Numero magazine and the photographer who shot the picture remind me of the dialogue we had and heard about in class on February 6th regarding the Pete Hoekstra Super Bowl ad. If you recall, the Super Bowl ad featured a young Asian girl and was seen as offensive by many people in how it depicted a minority. The photographer for Numero states that it was never his intention to be offensive and he had a different goal for the image, and that the editors added the text without his knowledge. This argument sounds similar to some expressed about the intentionality of the Hoekstra ad and whether they meant to be offensive. We also discussed what responsibility the young actress had in the Hoekstra video, debating if it was her fault to have participated. In this video, the reporters cite the model’s young age and lack of awareness in her defense, two arguments also used to defend the Asian actress in the Hoekstra video.

Although similar events have happened with magazines in the United States, because this image was published in a French magazine, does this have any implications for race relations and how race is seen in France? I mentioned before in class that while living in France I saw students dressed in blackface to school for Halloween and no one responded at all to that, as if it is perfectly normal and acceptable, whereas a child in the United States would be punished and sent home from school. This makes me wonder what (if any) response there was in France to this spread.  As author Bai states in his article “Constructing Racial Groups’ Identities in the Diasporic Press: Internalization, Resonance, Transparency, and Offset” (reading from 2/6), “the media help to define what race is and what meanings the imagery of race carries” (p. 388). What does this image show about perceptions of race today?

The photographer (whether he is telling the truth or not we don’t know) said that the picture was meant simply to be a woman with tanned bronze skin and he was not aware of the “African Queen” text. If this is true, why did the magazine editors choose to include the tanned model and the “African Queen” text together? If it was really the intention of the magazine to have an image of an African queen, why did they not just use a dark-skinned model of African descent? Would the image have been a controversy if the text “African Queen” was not included? Would it still be considered blackface or would it just be an image of a tan model? Do you think the magazine and photographer's explanations/apologies for the spread are acceptable? Who is to blame in this situation: the photographer, the model, or the magazine editors? Or is larger society to blame for the prevalence of white models over models of color in magazines and at New York Fashion Week?