http://www.lionsdenu.com/60-ridiculous-vintage-ads-that-couldnt-be-published-today-gallery/
The ad that I am referring to is pictured on the top left corner. If you are unable to view it, it is a vintage image of a housewife with a shocked look on her face holding what appears to be a ketchup bottle with the caption "You mean a woman can open it?"
A part of this ad that could be considered a sign is that her fingers are held delicately over the cap and her nails are painted in a very feminine color. This leads the viewer to read the woman as being weak and needing assistance for even the simplest tasks, for example opening a bottle.
The culture that this ad was being aimed at is very different from ours today. It was a culture where it was completely acceptable to see women as subordinate beings to men who needed to be taken care of. An ad like this would never be able to be used today, but was no problem at the time it was run.
The position that this ad puts me in is a very uncomfortable one. Like I previously stated, and advertisement like this would never “fly” these days and if it was used in the media, the company putting it out would have unfortunate repercussions for it. At the same time however, it is an interesting reminder of a fairly recent past for us and is almost humorous in this day.
I see things a different way. In those days, if I am not mistaken, a lot of jars and other forms of packaging were in jars and vacuum sealed to the point of practically needing some kind of advanced machinery to open one.
ReplyDeleteI think the advertisement simply appeals to Women and that they will no longer have to ask their husband to open the bottle, or rip apart the house trying to find something to pry it open. I mean, even today I have had extreme difficulty opening some items and have resorted to using tools to open things. Namely, the giant jars of green olives at the bar I work at.
Touching on that again, I think it appeals to the Woman's drive to be independent. The more tasks that a Woman can do under their own power the better, I don't think many will argue that gender equality is important. As we have seen in today's culture, the innovations of yesterday has yielded women equally equipped to deal with the challenges of today.
The ad is working on multiple levels, on one very basic level, I agree with Steven and can see how it is intended to be legitimately appealing to women as a means to open jars. But there are a lot of subtle implications, that while not directly stated are connoted along with the advertisement.
ReplyDeleteIt is depicting a woman in a gender role, in the 50s (assuming that's when the ad was made) women were seen as more or less the sole preparers of food, and she's holding a condiment bottle, something directly related to food preparation. to me, the statement "you mean a woman can open it?” Sounds like something one male would say in response to another male, not a female. It's also interesting that woman is underlined in the text.
I'm going to say something that might make me sound like an overanalyzing crackpot... Which I may be, but still, if you take a good look at the image, the advertisement has specifically sexual implications embedded within the visual composition. The figure is wearing red sexy Marilyn Monroe lipstick and nail polish. She's also holding a phallic shaped bottle up towards her lips, which are puckered like she's about to suck on a popsicle or something. Her fingers form a ring shape, and are simultaneously positioned in a way that makes it look like she's going to gently caress the bottle.
Moreover, the image takes on a strangely different appearance if you cut and crop out certain portions of the composition. When the figures face is isolated and removed from the rest of the image her expression changes significantly, or if just the bottle is removed leaving the rest of the image unchanged, especially its relationship to the hand.
Or I might just be imagining this because I've spent to much time in art analyzing paintings. Someone look at the image and tell me if I'm crazy.