chekhovandowl:

eschergirls:

fatpeopleart:

nepputune:

So I’ve seen a whole bunch of posts about body positivity. And it would be great, but they’re really bad at actually representing different body types; big girls in particular. So I’ve drawn a comparison.

I’m tired of seeing posts that totally miss the point. Those posts are supposed to make you feel good about your body. But it’s hard for bigger girls to feel good about themselves if they’re represented by women that aren’t big. Fat is okay. But here’s some things that people almost always ignore when drawing bigger ladies:

– Rolls

– Cellulite

– Stretch marks

And some misconceptions/ common mistakes:

– Larger breasts ( a LOT larger) 

– Wider hips

– Same size waist as girls with less body fat

I’m going to put it bluntly: I’m sick of seeing fatter girls be misrepresented. I’m tired of seeing posts getting glory for drawing bigger girls when they don’t. I have yet to see a body positivity post that shows cellulite, stretch marks, folds, and spillage. These things are real, and they’re beautiful.

So try and remember these things next time you try and represent fat girls. Because if you’re not thinking about the “ugly” stuff, you’re doing it wrong.

This is something I think a lot about when I moderate this blog. We get a lot of submissions depicting fat people who aren’t really… well, fat.

Fatter than what we see in a lot of art, sure. And I know for a lot of the artists submitting work, this might be the fattest person they’ve ever drawn, their first dipping of a timid toe into new waters. And I never want to discourage that. And there’s more than one way to be fat.

But we are still often seeing a fairly narrow representation of fat people in the artwork that gets submitted, and it gives me pause to think of this blog being used to reinforce this narrow representation.

I want to encourage artists to stretch themselves in their subject matter. Go further than “slightly rounder.” Find references, do some studying, figure out the way fat really looks.

I find that there are fewer resources for drawing fat people than there are of thin people. Due to societal pressure, many fat people are unwilling to model, many photographers taking reference photos exclude fat people from the artistic conversation, and it can be very rude to approach someone unsolicited and say “Can I study your fat?” It’s part of why I started this blog in the first place. We can learn from each other’s art, techniques that are harder to find in the mainstream art world.

I wonder sometimes if I should start another tumblr looking for artistic resources of fat people. User submitted reference photos of fat people in various poses to be used for artistic study. There are other blogs showcasing wonderful arrays of various body types, but sometimes you need specific poses, closeups of a shoulder blade or an ankle, you know? Perhaps it’s time to make this happen.

I think this is relevant and important commentary given that this blog talks about body diversity in art, and how even when people are drawing big women, they still may be adhering strongly to a certain way society believes women should appear.

(Note: to clear up a misconception, I believe the posts are talking about how there’s a certain body type that is used constantly to depict big women, not that it’s “wrong”, but that it’s a narrow type and a restrictive standard.)

This is super important! People definitely forget that women don’t only have one type of boobs and one type of face… and not only in the spectrum of drawing people of bigger sizes. I think it stems from something larger – the need that our society has developed to have ‘as close as we can to flawless’ women.

A trend I’ve started to notice is that when people draw larger women (or men) they usually try to… how can I relay this… “make up” for the fact that they’re fat by erasing some other features which are not considered socially acceptable. For example, a lot of them are clean-shaven and have perfect skin, hair, etc…

On the other hand, hairy legs and scars tend to appear on more skinny women whenever someone tries to make a point about how these things can be ‘beautiful’.

It’s almost as if we cannot let ourselves go over the quota of ‘ugly’ for any single drawing. Almost like the artist hesitates and goes “well, this one has enough unattractive traits already… better make up for it with some awesome Pantene hair”.

(Seriously… look at any ‘body pride’ lineup… I’ll guarantee that 90% of the fatter representatives will have smooth legs and perfect hair.)

Which, by the way, guys, is… not… how that works… 

Stretch marks are NOT just a thing that fat women have (almost everyone who has gone through a growth spurt has them…?). I’m by no extension large, but I have them too. And I have folds of skin when I sit, just like everyone else. People avoid these things a lot, because we tend to think of them as an ‘ugly’ trait on anyone. 

Which… it’s not? I’ve never quite understood why rolls were so taboo. My grandmother had them. My mom has them. I was around naked women a lot of when I was growing up, and my grandmother didn’t complain about her body once in front of me, which I really appreciate now, because I never picked up the idea that it was a bad thing to be bigger. 

Maybe we need to really start thinking about kicking down these traits and just start accepting that they’re a part of life… and a part of people’s bodies.