Those Bratz really must be giving Barbie a run for her money. Although the global economic climate led numerous designers and fashion houses to scale down their New York Fashion Week events, Mattel saw fit to engineer "a lavish runway show that attracted more than 1,400 to the largest fashion tent in Bryant Park on Saturday" ("Barbie Wouldn't Wear That!" So, maybe Barbie's iconic status affords the doll and its maker a bit more salience in contemporary "girls'" toy markets than the recent Bratz boom might lead us to think? Whether it's the novelty of a real-life Barbie fashion show or its glamorous association with the Bryant Park runway that made the event successful, what's clear is the exploitation of the relationships between fashion, spectacle, girl culture, and capital.
Perhaps the images I'm including here communicate more than yet another critical analysis of 'Barbie as model for gendered expectations' ever could. I will, however, say this: what I think is visually most telling is that only the white model is clearly 'fashioned' in the classic, iconic Barbie image.
Reference: Kensler, Chris. "Barbie Wouldn't Wear That!" FOXNews.com (February 16. 2009). http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,493664,00.html (accessed February 18, 2009).
Images from FOXNews
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