"A New Kind of Beauty"

[AdamSmith]

The second photo in this feature is Trey Thurston, known by many of us here.

Pictures of the week: A New Kind Of Beauty, by Phillip Toledano

Each week, the Guardian Weekend magazine's editorial team choose a picture, or a set of pictures, that particularly tickle their fancy. This week, their choice is Phillip Toledano's striking series, A New Kind of Beauty

• Hannah Booth
• The Guardian, Friday 3 May 2013 11.30 EDT

These are not 'my plastic surgery hell' stories lifted from the pages of the Daily Mail. These are individuals who have transformed the way they look through radical reconstructive surgery to the point where they still look human, only a little less so.

By photographing them in a flattering, highly stylised way – with a nod to the 16th-century portraitist Hans Holbein the Younger – Phillip Toledano subtly reinforces this notion. With their static postures, his subjects appear detached, their expressions frozen as much by the art direction as by their surgery.

Toledano’s interest in radical surgery followed a series of moving portraits he shot of his elderly father (dayswithmyfather.com) and of a man he shot who had undergone a lot of surgery. 'I’d been thinking about death and ageing while photographing Dad,' he says, 'and what struck me about this man was how, through his surgery, he was trying to defy the ageing process. He was mesmerising.'

Through word of mouth and social media, Toledano tracked down others who had undergone extensive plastic surgery, and the project grew.

If Toledano is trying to make a point, it is that we consider where we’re heading as a species. 'I wanted to ask what we might look like in 50 or 100 years. Will plastic surgery become as normal as wearing makeup or having a tattoo is today?'

'For many people, these portraits are hard to look at. But the subjects have created their own idea of beauty, and that’s courageous. They are all happy with, and proud of, the way they look.'

With the means radically to alter the way we look now freely available to us, it’s interesting, Toledano says, to examine how people choose to look. As the government considers tougher controls on plastic surgery, following Sir Bruce Keogh’s report on the dangers of the 'normalisation' of such procedures, that choice may become harder.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/gallery/2013/may/03/pictures-of-week-extreme-cosmetic-surgery#/?picture=408021353&index=0

[RA1]

Isn't #2 an escort or former escort? I suppose as a Libertarian I have to let folks do whatever cranks their tractor but I don't have to approve, do I?

Best regards,

RA1

[boiworship]

Frightening.

[Suckrates]

My suggestion, the subjects should all get New mirrors, and the articles Author should take a trip to LensCrafters.....

[wayout]

Isn't #2 an escort or former escort? I suppose as a Libertarian I have to let folks do whatever cranks their tractor but I don't have to approve, do I?

Best regards,

RA1

Perhaps you are thinking of Trey Thurston. It does, to me at least, look somewhat like him.

[AdamSmith]

Yes, it is Trey.

Note how I carefully concealed that fact in the first line of the OP.

[RA1]

I suppose I need to immediately go to my ophthalmologist for a check up. Apparently I was so eager to view the pix I disregarded the script.

However, in a minor defense, there have been pix and script suggesting that Trey is not the one pictured. I disagree and defer to you, AS. Just don't make a habit of tricking me.

Best regards,

RA1

[AdamSmith]

Just don't make a habit of tricking me.

I promise I will save it for special occasions.

Trey has famously been featured in several media spots on extreme plastic surgery. (These, however, use his real name, so as I understand it would be against board policy to link here.)

[lookin]

Note how I carefully concealed that fact in the first line of the OP.

First line, you say?

Eluded me completely.

Zut alors!!

[Guest jimboivyo]

yep, that's trey. he keeps making himself look weirder and weirder. poor guy

I stopped seeing him when he went with the muscle implants. ever felt those things? like mostly hard plastic. really a turn off when one of them is digging into your rib. been there, done that.

[BigK]

These people look terrible. Trey is the only one I know how he originally looked. He had an interesting exotic look. In my estimation he looks horrible now. He turned a lot of tricks to get his look (and found a few sugar daddies on the way).

[TotallyOz]

Remember beauty is in the eye of the beholder. We never know what someone sees when they look in the mirror. What we perceive as horrible may be beauty in their eyes.

I am always happy when I look into the mirror and see Robert Redford staring back. (his photo is on the top right corner of the mirror)

Trey is a sweetheart and I always thought he was beautiful and needed no work. But, he must have done this for himself.

For those of you who have not read Bangkok 8 by John Burdett give it a read. It relates to this topic and it was the first thing I thought of when I saw those photos.

[AdamSmith]

I posted this because I appreciated the respectful stance of the Guardian reporter's notes, and certainly the interest of the photographer's approach. They are in marked contrast to the smarmy, pseudo-respectful archness of the television segments I mentioned above.

Oz, thank you for the pointer to Bangkok 8. I just read the opening chapter on Amazon and am hooked.

[Suckrates]

Remember beauty is in the eye of the beholder. We never know what someone sees when they look in the mirror. What we perceive as horrible may be beauty in their eyes.

And theres such a thing called "Cataracts" ! :hyper:

[Guest NCBored]

Yes, it is Trey.

Note how I carefully concealed that fact in the first line of the OP.

Hey, when you give us pictures, how can you expect us to read text?