SELFIES – THE LOVE CHILD WAY
Almost all of us do it. Doesn’t really matter where or when. I love it and do it every chance I get. It makes you feel good – before, during and after. And if you’re good at it, it makes you look great, too.
Selfies, that is. Smartphone self-portraits taken while extending one’s arm out fully, a global phenom since about 2004. Last year alone, when the Oxford Dictionaries coined it “word of the year,” apparently 57 million #selfie tags blew up on Instagram. Personally, I try to capture my look day and evening, sporting one of my fave Liebeskinds, natch.
Selfies are hot news right now, too. Super star soccer god David Beckham burned up the broadband after he snagged a family selfie during his wife’s NYFW runway show a couple days ago. LuckyMag.com sports tips from hairstylist Jen Atkin for mastering a super-hot selfie. There’s even “Me So Selfie,” the catchy Bonapart and Tim Fite song tearing up the ‘net. While some blogs say that selfies are out of control, shot in inappropriate places (like funerals or memorials) or ways (too sexual), others point to the narcissistic side of selfies, saying that selfies are a cry for help. At the beginning of the year, #365FeministSelfie, an Instagram selfie campaign kicked off as a backlash against all that.
From left: Nathalie.Violette and Tatiana
I like to think of selfies as an expression of self-love, worth and acceptance. It’s not so much about the number of “likes” you get on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or Flickr. It’s more about the inner likes you give yourself, every day.
I really like Dove Soap’s #BeautyIs, a campaign aimed at redefining beauty that recently premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Dove asked women to take “an honest selfie, with no filters, no edits. And to ask your mother to do the same.” Then they gave those selfies a gallery showing.
So, I tried a similar sort of test with our Liebeskind office and you can see above what my family of Love Children lensed.
What’s your favorite way to share a selfie and how do you style yourself?
