Rebekah Frumkina. Ode to glossy magazines

Ode to glossy magazines - 2
Rebekah Frumkina

Publication date: April 7, 2000

"Ladies, ladies, don't blow your nose on the curtains!.."

I learned about the phenomenon of the magazine “for ladies” in 1966 from a book. It was Edmonde Charles-Roux's novel Forgetting Palermo. He has just received the prestigious Renaudo literary prize. I also learned about the award from a printed source - from Literaturka (note for grandchildren: not only there was no Internet, but also “Echo of Moscow”). The intelligentsia subscribed to Literaturka as a family newspaper, and no one knew that they would live to see such newspapers as Segodnya or Zavtra. True, after 1956 there was more confidence that we would simply live to see tomorrow - but this is a different topic.

The book was sent by a colleague from Paris. I still don’t understand why they gave the prize. Because I didn’t appreciate the sad irony with which the life of the New York elite, and especially the editors of the fictional women’s magazine “FAIR” (a hint of the real “BAZAAR”?) is described there. But I remembered one phrase forever. The young Italian woman, on whose behalf the story is told, is perplexed: what is the point of spending so much effort in order to completely get rid of her individuality and look completely indistinguishable from others?

And now the equivalents of the fictitious “FAIR”, as well as the real “BAZAAR”, sculpted in Moscow and its environs, are sold at a kiosk around the corner.

The key to the success of mass magazines “for ladies”, “for men”, “for girls”, etc. - in their diversity. Assuming, of course, that the tastes and wallet of the consumer are varied: I have a mongrel, you have fish, someone has a spaniel with a pedigree. Do not flatter yourself, however, that you were actually born with the ability to cultivate and appreciate this diversity - you learned it. But how we learned and what exactly - see above and below.

With all the impoverishment and deprivation of the population, which statistics indicate, for the first time before our eyes, a generation is growing up, brought up on a variety of consumption and the possibility of choice. I don't see anything good in the fact that the entire country has been forced to wash baby diapers for decades using the same type of "baby" soap. Unfortunately, everyone sweats - but 15 years ago you could only get used to deodorant by driving west of Chop. The existence of Gucci, Patou and Saint Laurent was heard either by “outsiders” or by those who could read the same “BAZAAR”. Or "LOOK" - by the way, where did you read it? In special storage, of course! (Grandchildren - please contact your parents for clarification. I was never able to explain to my German graduate student what SPECIAL STORAGE is and why they kept not only Monde and the Times THERE, but also magazines with beauties in Chanel toilets - by the way , fully dressed.)

If women love with their ears, then they consume - in no small measure! - eyes. Anyway, that's the first step.

A funny observation: Varya, one and a half years old, called any shoe sneakers ( sneakers had not yet been invented). The psychologist mom is at a loss. It turns out that this was Varya’s envy towards another girl who had sneakers.

So, first we consume with our eyes. This happens most effectively when we consume unnoticed - not in a store, but leisurely leafing through the pages of a magazine. (I recommend ELLE.) Here is SHE in a cozy terry robe. Here in a dazzling tennis skirt. Under the shower in a turquoise swimsuit. After a shower with magical oil that softens the skin. Here I am with a coffee pot - that is, She, well, in general, if I buy it for 409 USD. a modest dress from Gianfranco Ferre (by the way, not far from here, in Petrovsky Passage), then a completely different life will begin...

And it is right. And since a woman’s life is not limited to a robe or even an evening dress, a women’s magazine will write about more or less everything. Firstly, about HER (actually, as if about YOUR) men. It is clear what , but there is still where and when . And which is better. And even though it wouldn’t be worth it.

“Next - everywhere” - in any women's magazine there will be stories about pop stars, portraits of top models, confessions of readers, everyday stories, advice from cosmetologists, some culinary recipes, horoscopes and gossip columns. And also an invitation to travel. Preferably - to the most exotic places, where exactly is not important; Egypt, Brittany and Kostroma are equally suitable if the editors manage to present this as an achievable dream. (The heroine of “Forgetting Palermo” is an expert in the temptation of the magic of voyages.)

The constitutive principle of all women's magazines is that you CAN be like SHE. If you follow our advice...

This is where the professional tricks begin. Don't think that a women's magazine is advertising pictures flavored with texts. (Even if such a misfortune happened that the Star advertising agency managed to buy the first two spreads in three different magazines for April at once and place there not just Lancome advertising, but exactly the same pictures, which produces the opposite effect.)

A women's magazine as a brand advertises YOU, you personally. But not today’s, but transformed by his magic mirror.

We are all different, which means that women's magazines should be clearly targeted at different ages and different appetites. An option is when the Women’s brand of a given magazine is so perfect that it is equidistant from all of us and is therefore delightful.

This last option realizes "ELLE" - no cheap chic; if Cindy Crawford is in the aura of motherhood, if ready-to-wear from the best masters, then in the image of a dark-eyed, fragile aristocratic girl; if the interior is a suite of rooms of Count and Countess Roquemorell-Golitsyn (green-golden palette of rare nobility).

Impeccable design, excellent texts.

At the other pole, alas, the opposite not only in age orientation, but also in quality, “Marusya” is found. This is a magazine for girls. With a circulation of 50 thousand, something of an incredibly low level is printed, primarily in terms of design and printing. Even the Soviet “Rabotnitsa” would not have allowed herself to blind type with a black typeface on a dark red background, almost with font size 10. And what about the advertisement of the company “Max Factor” as “affordable cosmetics”? And the headline on the cover: “How to manipulate ancestors?” And the cover-girl is a fifteen-year-old girl with such a vulgarly painted face that in comparison with her, Lolita from the film with Jeremy Irons looks like a schoolgirl from a Victorian boarding school. As the unhypocritical Herzen used to say, curtain! a curtain!

However, do not despair - there is also "Marie-Claire" - a good, 150-page magazine "for women in general." And, importantly, it was perfectly printed not just anywhere, but here in Moscow on Stolyarny Lane. The design, however, is colorful and somewhat varied in color, as if the layout was made by different artists. The April issue contains two interesting works - a portrait of eighty-year-old Nina Ivens by photographer Vladimir Karchin (in the reportage series “Love against the backdrop of the century”) and an exquisitely natural way of presenting rings and rings, when the photo shows women’s hands playing cards and chess and roulette (photographer Dmitry Beldyushkin). I don't know if it was his idea, but it turned out elegant.

Here is another magazine - thinner and simpler - "She" ("SHE"). Compared to other "ladies'" magazines, "ONA" turned out to be very talkative. But these texts seem to be written by the same author, whose taste (whose?) makes one curious: maybe #4 is a special issue for the sexually anxious? Or is it always like this for “HER”?

At the same time, I re-read my copy of "Oublier Palerme" - exactly thirty years and three years later. Like Elle, this novel can now be read in Russian. I recommend it to the lady of your heart. You will thank me later - a good mirror is always handy for a woman.