Throughout history, women's bodies have been colonised by patriarchy, dictating the way they should look. Although beauty norms differ from one culture to another, one criterion has been endorsed by most civilisations; hairlessness of the body. For men, pilosity is a positive asset, symbolising virility. However, it's quite the contrary for women whose femininity is determined by the opposite: an absence of hair in their bodies. Hairless women are seen as more youthful, attractive, and lady-like, thus considered more socially acceptable and presentable. Conversely, women who don't remove their body hair are labelled as undesirable and filthy, experiencing social, cultural and even economic marginalisation in the process.
Over time, the feminist movement has mushroomed, and women claimed their right to control their bodies. Among things challenged by feminists are the unrealistic female body ideals. Ways to resist the patriarchal order vary; while some women choose to protest in the streets, others, like Esther Calixte-Béa, opt to express their autonomy through art. Indeed, the arts have always played a central role in influencing public opinion, and in this case, the 25-year-old from Montreal, Canada, expresses pride in her body hair through statues with gold dust-adorned chests and paintings of green flecked bodies that connect growth from the female form to that of the natural world. In the summer of 2019, the rising artist also starred in a self-portrait project called Lavender, in which she uses herself as a muse to broaden the scope of our perceptions of femininity, as she highlights her body hair against a hyperfeminine backdrop of elegant chiffon dresses and jewellery.
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Today, Calixte-Béa is an immensely self-assured young woman, but her confidence has not always been the case, having struggled with her body image during her teenage years. In an interview with Glamour UK, she spoke about how she disliked her body and often compared herself with other girls in her high school. Like many girls at such a sensitive age where self-esteem is fragile, the photographer hated herself, not only because of her hairiness but also because she was slim-framed while her female peers were curvy. She told the British magazine how she didn't feel desired by boys, like her classmates. Like many women who were conditioned to fit into some rigid patterns, Calixite-Béa felt rejected by society.
Since the age of just 11, the Canadian artist has tried different methods of hair removal, to a damaging effect, telling 24 hours: "Plus je m’épilais, plus je commençais à avoir des cicatrices, des poils incarnés, plein de bosses sur mon corps", which translates to: "The more I waxed, the more I began to have scars, ingrown hairs, full of bumps on my body"
The anxiety of the young photographer increased, and while she stopped trying to remove her body hair, she was still intent on hiding it under her clothes. However, this constant anxiety soon got the best of her, leading to exhaustion and mental health problems: "It became exhausting, and I realised how my body hair issues were affecting me mentally", she tells Glamour UK.
Luckily, Calixte-Béa's mother was there to re-affirm her value. Again speaking to Glamour UK, the Haitian-Ivorian Canadian relayed how her mother would make the artist and her sister stand in front of the mirror and repeat the following words: "I'm pretty, I'm smart, and I'm beautiful" as a near-daily ritual. The artist claims this process formed a vital part in her reaching self-acceptance.
Thus, Calixte-Béa's most pivotal project, Lavender, expresses an epiphany of sorts, depicting a full embrace of one's natural state and a rejection of conventional expectations for women. Accordingly, she describes her work as "a self-liberating self-photography project about femininity and body hair. It questions what makes a female body feminine and why is body hair that naturally grows on mature human bodies seen as not normal."
The photographer found similarities between plants in nature and body hair. Coming from a family of dressmakers, she made her own lavender-coloured, double-sided dress, one side covering the chest hair, a symbol of her struggles, and the other side revealing her hairy chest to the world.
The young woman concluded her interview with Glamour UK, resolving that there is nothing wrong with her body. Rather, the only toxic thing is how hair removal companies benefit from women's self-hatred and make billions out of it.
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In fact, a 2017 study conducted by hair removal specialists Centros Unico revealed that although 49% of women hate the idea of removing their body hair, the average woman spends a whopping £23,000 to wax away unwanted hair throughout her lifetime. Those who prefer to shave dedicate £6,500 and eight weeks of their life dealing with body hair. The very depiction of the hair removal process adds to our discomfort. It's rare to see women in shaving adverts actually present hairy skin. Instead, we see those already hairless futilely use razors, creams and wax strips. Companies like billie, a woman-owned razor and body care brand, subvert these standards, liberally depicting hairy women in their ads as a means of both normalising female body hair and showing the effectiveness of their products.
Aside from self-portraits, Calixte-Béa also paints. Her first paintings expressed her pain when she had to hide her chest hair. Now, the artist portrays black hairy women happy with their bodies. Telling 24 hours, she declares, "Les femmes que je peins ont du poil, et elles vivent leur vie! C'est tout!", which translates to, "The women I paint have hair, and they live their lives! That's all!".