Imogen Haggath

As I am already a makeup student studying Hair and Makeup for Fashion, I chose Hair and Makeup for Performance as my better lives theme as I wanted an insight on the different techniques and the creativity process behind creating a character. The Better Lives themes are present whilst creating a character in various ways: diversity through adaptation and evolution, sustainability through ecological balance and social responsibility through personal identity.

There are various similarities and differences when it comes to hair and makeup for fashion and for performance. Makeup for performance creates a character through prosthetics such as painted illusions, distortion, 3D and textual effects. Whereas in hair and makeup for fashion, the aim is usually to follow a trend, conceal any imperfections, beautify the face for everyday wear. Additionally, makeup can create a ‘fashion statement’ in a context such as runways or editorials. Makeup for performance can create characters with distortions; whereas, makeup for fashion beautifies a person to fit current western beauty standards. Therefore, I find makeup for performance to be much more diverse than makeup for fashion as ‘creating a character’ leads to more diversity in the creative process.

In terms of practice, they are similar as both subjects teach health and safety, linking to the theme of social responsibility. Products must be sanitised, and clean practice is required when working on models to ensure no bacteria or infections can be passed from one model to another. However, this puts pressure on the sustainability of makeup practice as disposable cotton pads, buds and wipes are commonly used when working with makeup hygienically. However, amidst the COVID19 situation going on, I have been instructed to approach the project by drawing a plan for a character I would have liked to have created using prosthetics. Therefore, waste was not created through following the hygienic practice of makeup as I did not have the access to the prosthetics makeup or a model.

I wanted to create a character based on a combination of both diversity and sustainability. As the earth is getting hotter due to global warming, my character adapted to this with skin defects that resemble sun damaged skin. If I were to do this on a model, I would have used prosthetic techniques such as distortion effects to create imbalances on the skin and painted illusion to modify the colour.

I have begun to think differently about the topic of diversity in makeup. I have always seen diversity as being inclusive, which is very important in makeup; however, I had not thought about diversity in terms of evolution and adaptation like I have been doing for creating a character for performance. This has broadened my ideas on diversity and made me think more openly about ways in which my character can be diverse. For example, one character idea a peer had made based on the idea of diversity in adaptation was a mermaid which appeared to have hair, and was critiqued for this as an underwater character would possibly not need hair if it was adapted to the water and you do not see fish with hair. I found it intriguing that context plays a role in creating a diverse character and is not just created to ‘look pretty’ like in hair and makeup for fashion.

As I have now begun working on my Better Lives project in developing a character, I have started to make connections with the themes of diversity, social responsibility and sustainability in my creative practice.

Creating a character requires us to think about inclusive characters that resonate with a global audience. We must consider skin tones, ages and disability when creating a character to ensure it is perceived properly from a modern and global perspective. To do so, we have begun to learn about corrective colour theory, ageing from a distant read and realistic skin effects. I have also thought about how key characters that have had recurring representations in film and performance over the last 100 years. An example of this would be how characters perceived as evil would often be represented with facial disfigurations, and how this may be offensive to an audience and how it can lack diversity in a group of character representations.

When considering the lecture on diversity by Shahidha Bari, she spoke about how designers can be ignorant to how it can be offensive to others, designers and teams that are not diverse behind the scenes, which made me consider prosthetics artists over the last 100 years in British performance may have created characters that are not completely diverse due to this possible lack of diversity in prosthetics and costume design teams – leading to an over representation of ‘bad’ characters having some sort of disability or facial disfigurations. Therefore, in my own practice of creating a character, I want to remain as inclusive as possible in order to avoid creating any offensive characters.

Considering social responsibility, I began to attach this theme to areas of health and safety in creating a character. It is vital in prosthetics to ensure that the models that you use are treated appropriately. This includes identifying allergies, using skin safe products and being gentle with the skin. In addition you do not want to spread any bacteria from model to model, so it is important that grease palettes (which can easily mutate and spread bacteria) is disinfected before using, along with the brushes that are used. For this reason, whenever I’m creating a character, I have the responsibility to ensure that I follow all health and safety procedures so that the models I work on are safe. I can also apply this information to my own course in hair and makeup for fashion as a similar practice takes place to put the safety of models first.

There are also some ways in which we should be more sustainable when creating a character. For example, taking off prosthetic makeup can require a lot of cotton pads and some of the prosthetics cannot be reused, which can create a lot of waste. When I create my character, I must consider this and possibly look for alternatives such as reusable cotton pads and a reduced use of non-reusable prosthetics.

Overall, I believe that all three themes have an important role when creating a character. I must remain diverse, sustainable and take social responsibility throughout the creative process of my prosthetic makeup work.

Throughout the course of these lectures, I’ve found that the lecture I am most interested in was the Power lecture by Julia Crew. I found it interesting that the power of fashion should lie in the origin of creativity, but it now lies in the economic power, as fashion is increasingly becoming a commercial product.

In the lectures I learned that factories are being pushed to produce larger amounts at cheaper prices forcing unpaid overtime and harassment. This may also push companies to produce in other countries that produces their products quicker and where the legal minimum wage falls short and keeps people stuck in the cycle of poverty and exploitation. In addition, the growth of technology, there’s a higher number of influencers and advertisers pushing consumers to buy the latest fashion, hair and makeup trends. An example of this would be that researchers suggest that 200 million Instagram users follow at least one fashion account, who have influence on their followers surrounding the trends – in a lot of cases, fast fashion. This severely affects sustainability due to mass produce of fast fashion. In addition, it calls into concern ethical issues surrounding fair trade and employment due to the fast rate of production companies are driven to for maximum profit.

As I am a makeup and hair for fashion student, I find that with the fashion industry, makeup and hair plays a part in becoming a large role in economic power. The industry has exploded, with fashion, in becoming a disposable industry with mass productions. When looking into this I found that large makeup brands, I found that a lot of brands mislead their customers by claiming to be vegan and instead, testing on animals in order to sell products into China. This shows they are abusing their power in order to receive higher profits from foreign countries with different laws and restrictions surrounding animal testing, and additionally misleading their vegan consumers.

However, the lecture showed the argument that the consumer has substantial power, the power to spend their money and ‘vote with their wallet’ on what to support.  Its argued that we can take steps to make a change in the direction that we are going in by personal decisions, so we can eliminate our wasteful mindsets. Alongside this, influences speak out to talk about the fashion industry critically, which contradicts the idea that influencers help promote the fast fashion industry. 

My own personal perspective from this lecture is that there is power at every stage, yet some power can be negative whilst other power may be positive. Power driven by profit brings a lot of ethical, social and environmental issues. However, power which is driven by morals can be beneficial, for example: consumers actively choosing not to support certain brands due to their own concerns around the issues the brand may be creating, which essentially will affect their profits. One of the main elements of power is within us, as power can be small, power can be collective and power is also about freedom, there is an ability for us to challenge the system.