A new Calvin Klein underwear ad has caused a
stir in America because it features a photo taken from underneath a woman’s
skirt, focused on her crotch.
The photo is of a model named Klara Kristin, 23, who wears a cream-colored
skirt and looks down at the floor-level camera.
The ad campaign is called “I flash in #my calvins.”
The photo triggered an outpouring of disgust and reproach on social media
and elsewhere.
“Calvin Klein is marketing to perverts,” a headline in the New York Post
screamed.
Take a peek:
@karate_katia, photographed by @harleyweir for the Spring 2016 advertising
campaign. #mycalvinsA photo
posted by Calvin Klein (@calvinklein) on May 9, 2016 at 3:45pm
PDT
“@CalvinKlein, your ad sexualizes young girls. We’re #NotBuyingIt,”
tweeted
the account Miss Representation, part of the Representation Project, which
says it works to fight stereotypes and social injustice.
The National Center on Sexual Exploitation said the ad depicted a form of
sexual harassment, namely ‘up-skirting’ — the practice of taking shots up a
woman’s skirt without her knowledge or consent.
The center launched a petition calling on the fashion house to “stop
normalizing and glamorizing sexual harassment.”
But as of Thursday afternoon, the photo remained on the Calvin Klein
Twitter feed.
Calvin Klein ad campaigns are often sexy, and sometimes feature models
who
look androgenous and are very young.
In 1981, the American actress Brooke Shields, then 16, posed in tight
Calvin Klein jeans with her legs spread. She looks at the camera and says,
“You want to know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing.”
(AFP)