A
cover girl is a woman whose
photographA photograph is an image created by light falling on a light-sensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic imager such as a CCD or a CMOS chip. Most photographs are created using a camera, which uses a lens to focus the scene's visible wavelengths of light into a reproduction of...
features on the front cover of a
magazineMagazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles, generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...
. She may be a
modelthumb|200px|Alesya Nazarova modeling a dress by [[bebe stores|bebe]]A model , sometimes called a mannequin, is a person who is employed for the purpose of displaying and promoting fashion clothing or other products and for advertising or promotional purposes or who poses for works of art.Modeling...
,
celebrityA celebrity is a person who is famously recognized in a society or culture.Generally speaking, a celebrity is someone who gets media attention and most frequently has an extroverted personality. The desire to be notable is implied by some to be a part of Western culture and more specifically the...
or entertainer. The term would generally not be used to describe a casual, once-off appearance by a person on the cover of a magazine.
The term first appeared in
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
in 1915. A less commonly used antonym is cover boy.
Women feature on the cover of the majority of general-interest magazines in the west for both men and women, although there are notable exceptions discussed below.
Celebrities feature on the cover of magazines such as
RedbookRedbook is an American women's magazine published by the Hearst Corporation. It is one of the "Seven Sisters", a group of women's service magazines.-History:...
for women, or
Gentlemen's Quarterly,
MaximMaxim is an international men's magazine based in the United Kingdom and known for its revealing pictorials featuring popular actresses, singers, and female models, none of whom are nude in the American version....
or
Esquire for men.
A
cover girl is a woman whose
photographA photograph is an image created by light falling on a light-sensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic imager such as a CCD or a CMOS chip. Most photographs are created using a camera, which uses a lens to focus the scene's visible wavelengths of light into a reproduction of...
features on the front cover of a
magazineMagazines, periodicals, glossies or serials are publications, generally published on a regular schedule, containing a variety of articles, generally financed by advertising, by a purchase price, by pre-paid magazine subscriptions, or all three...
. She may be a
modelthumb|200px|Alesya Nazarova modeling a dress by [[bebe stores|bebe]]A model , sometimes called a mannequin, is a person who is employed for the purpose of displaying and promoting fashion clothing or other products and for advertising or promotional purposes or who poses for works of art.Modeling...
,
celebrityA celebrity is a person who is famously recognized in a society or culture.Generally speaking, a celebrity is someone who gets media attention and most frequently has an extroverted personality. The desire to be notable is implied by some to be a part of Western culture and more specifically the...
or entertainer. The term would generally not be used to describe a casual, once-off appearance by a person on the cover of a magazine.
The term first appeared in
EnglishEnglish is a West Germanic language that developed in England during the Anglo-Saxon era. As a result of the military, economic, scientific, political, and cultural influence of the British Empire during the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries, and of the United States since the mid 20th century,...
in 1915. A less commonly used antonym is cover boy.
Types of cover girl
Women feature on the cover of the majority of general-interest magazines in the west for both men and women, although there are notable exceptions discussed below.
Celebrities feature on the cover of magazines such as
RedbookRedbook is an American women's magazine published by the Hearst Corporation. It is one of the "Seven Sisters", a group of women's service magazines.-History:...
for women, or
Gentlemen's Quarterly,
MaximMaxim is an international men's magazine based in the United Kingdom and known for its revealing pictorials featuring popular actresses, singers, and female models, none of whom are nude in the American version....
or
Esquire for men. The use of
royaltyA royal family is the extended family of a king or queen regnant. The term "imperial family" more appropriately describes the extended family of an emperor or empress regnant, while the terms "ducal family", "grand ducal family" or "princely family" are more appropriate in reference to the...
or
aristocracyAristocracy is a form of government, in which a few of the most prominent citizens rule. This may be a hereditary elite, or it may be by a system of cooption where a council of prominent citizens add leading soldiers, merchants, land owners, priests, and lawyers to their number...
is linked to this: the primary objective is recognition.
Some magazines for women feature an unknown
modelthumb|200px|Alesya Nazarova modeling a dress by [[bebe stores|bebe]]A model , sometimes called a mannequin, is a person who is employed for the purpose of displaying and promoting fashion clothing or other products and for advertising or promotional purposes or who poses for works of art.Modeling...
that represents the style of the magazine, such as
SeventeenSeventeen is an American magazine for teenagers. It was first published in 1944 by Walter Annenberg's Triangle Publications. News Corporation bought Triangle in 1988, and sold Seventeen to K-III Communications in 1991. Primedia sold the magazine to Hearst in 2003. It is still in the forefront of...
. A parallel to this trend is reflected in men’s magazines like
Men's FitnessMen’s Fitness is a men’s magazine published by American Media, Inc. Founded in the United States in 1987, it was originally called Sports Fitness. The premier issue featured Michael Pare from the television show, The Greatest American Hero. The name of the magazine was changed to Men’s Fitness in...
or
Sports IllustratedSports Illustrated is an American sports magazine owned by media conglomerate Time Warner. It has over 3 million subscribers and is read by 23 million adults each week, including over 18 million men, 19% of the adult males in the United States. It was the first magazine with circulation over one...
.
An intermediate category is the use of a model or
supermodelThe term supermodel refers to a highly-paid élite fashion model who usually has a worldwide reputation and often a background in haute couture and commercial modeling. The term was elevated to prominence in the popular culture of the 1990s. Supermodels usually work for top fashion designers and...
who is recognizable because of their exposure in magazines or advertising, a strategy often adopted by
ELLEElle may refer to:*Elle *Ellé, a river in the region of Brittany, France*Elle, Central African Republic*Elle of Sussex, a Saxon king*Elle, an orthographic unit consisting of ll in Spanish orthography...
magazine.
In most cases, the objective is to maximize sales and differentiation, while also expressing the
brandA brand is a name or trademark connected with a product or producer. Brands have become increasingly important components of culture and the economy, now being described as "cultural accessories and personal philosophies".-Concepts:...
values of the title.
In Vietnam the term for a girl found in bars that will go with a client for sexual favours is a cover girl.
Editorial approaches and the market-place
Editorial decisions concerning the positioning of the magazine in the market-place are a key influence on the portrayal of women on the cover.
In the 20th century, numerous women's magazines would feature royalty or aristocracy on their covers. In the 1980s and 1990s,
Diana, Princess of WalesDiana, Princess of Wales, was the first wife of Charles, Prince of Wales. Their sons, Princes William and Harry, are second and third in line to the thrones of the United Kingdom and fifteen other Commonwealth Realms.A public figure from the announcement of her engagement to Prince Charles, Diana...
would be a popular cover choice—but usually for weeklies, usually shot by
paparazziPaparazzi is a plural term for photographers who take unstaged and/or candid photographs of celebrities caught unaware. Paparazzi take photos of celebrities at moments when the subjects do not expect to be photographed, such as when they shop, walk through a city, eat at a restaurant, or swim or...
, so strictly these were not "cover girl" images. However, there were exceptions where authorized portraits of royalty, such as Diana,
Princess BeatricePrincess Beatrice may refer to:*Princess Beatrice of England , daughter of Henry II of England and Eleanor of Provence, married John II of Brittany...
and Queen Elizabeth II, were taken for
VogueVogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine published in 16 countries + Latin America by Condé Nast Publications. Each month, Vogue publishes a magazine addressing topics of fashion, life and design.-Style and influence:...
,
TatlerTatler has been the name of several British journals and magazines, each of which has viewed itself as the successor of the original literary and society journal founded by Richard Steele in 1709...
and
Harper's BazaarHarper's Bazaar is a well-known American fashion magazine, first published in 1867. Harper's Bazaar considers itself to be the style resource for "the well-dressed woman and the well-dressed mind"....
. Despite public complaints about exploitation in the 1990s, publishers have not shied away from using royalty when possible.
New men’s style magazines founded in the 1980s, like
ArenaAn arena is an enclosed area, often circular or oval-shaped, designed to showcase theater, musical performances, or sporting events. It is composed of a large open space surrounded on most or all sides by tiered seating for spectators. The key feature of an arena is that the event space is the...
and
Gentlemen's Quarterly rarely featured women on the cover, and where they did they were intended not to be sexually provocative, deliberately distancing the magazine from ‘top shelf’ soft core pornographic magazines. Notably
Esquire’s first edition featured a photograph of
Brigitte BardotBrigitte Anne-Marie Bardot is an animal rights activist and a former French actress, fashion model and singer.In her early life Bardot was an aspiring ballet dancer. She started her acting career in 1952 and after appearing in 16 films became world-famous due to her role in the controversial film...
that was over thirty years old. However, this trend changed during the 1990s, initially with
Loaded in the UK, followed by
FHMFHM, originally published as For Him Magazine, is an international monthly men's lifestyle magazine.- History :The magazine began publication in 1985 in the United Kingdom under the name For Him and changed its title to FHM in 1994 when Emap Consumer Media bought the magazine, although the full For...
.
GQ’s UK edition was eventually forced to follow suit.
Later Peter Howarth, UK editor of
Esquire famously removed semi-naked women from the covers in a move to once again differentiate the magazine from the competition. The result was a drop in sales but an increase in advertising revenue, as the magazine was able to attract advertisers for more high-end products than before.
The rise of celebrity culture in the late 1980s and early 1990s has seen to the appearance of more actresses on magazine covers, especially among fashion magazines. This may be due to a convergence in the
mass mediaMass media denotes a section of the media specifically designed to reach a very large audience such as the population of a nation state. The term was coined in the 1920s with the advent of nationwide radio networks, mass-circulation newspapers and magazines. However, some forms of mass media such...
between traditional models and actresses: models gained a greater profile in the 1980s, largely through the “supermodels”, and became celebrities in their own right. Actresses, meanwhile, saw appearances in fashion magazines as beneficial to their careers and overall profiles. In addition, numerous models made the move into acting. Finally, there is the issue of
salesA sale is the pinnacle activity involved in selling products or services in return for money or other compensation. It is an act of completion of a commercial activity.A sale is completed by the seller, the owner of the goods...
: a recognizable face will, theoretically, shift more magazines.
The choice of model depends in some part on one's potential recognition in the market-place in which the title is sold. For example,
LucireLucire is a fashion magazine that originally began on the web in 1997, branching into a monthly print edition in its home country of New Zealand in 2004...
Romania saw its sales and profile increase after using a local cover girl, Monica Gabor, rather than those photographed by the “master edition” in
New ZealandNew Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses , and numerous smaller islands, most notably Stewart Island/Rakiura and the Chatham Islands. The indigenous Māori named New Zealand Aotearoa, commonly translated as The Land of the Long White Cloud...
.
While familiarity is a desirable trait for magazine covers—hence the top models and celebrities can charge large amounts for a photographic shoot—there is always the problem of overexposure and dilution of one's image. If, for instance, the majority of covers featured a small handful of celebrities, then the differentiation becomes minimal (e.g. in certain months in 2005, Paris Hilton featured on numerous covers), and there would, in theory, be a tendency to promote lesser known faces.
In the 2000s, some have predicted the demise of the actress or celebrity from fashion magazine covers, citing overexposure and growing cynicism. However, with the success of magazines such as
InStyle, which uses celebrity covers, there is little evidence that the predictions are being realized in the middle of the decade.
Image editing
Image editing is common practice for photographs used in advertising and publicity, and cover images are no exception. Image editing is an ongoing process of styling and selection, which invites debate on issues related to the representation of women. Arguably, advertising and cover images can help perpetuate an unattainable ideal of beauty, sometimes aided through methods of retouching to remove skin
blemishBlemish may refer to:*A minor imperfection. For skin imperfection, see Acne vulgaris*Blemish a music album from David Sylvian released in 2003....
es and shadows under the eyes, smooth out skin texture, widen pupils, or suggest an hourglass figure.
A contrary viewpoint has been put forward by some in the trade, saying that a retouched photograph is actually more representative of the subject. The theory is that when one is in the presence of the person, one does not notice the blemishes. Retouching, therefore, restores the “energy” of the subject.
External links