Going to extremes - but will it ever be beauty?

A shocking book on extreme cosmetic surgery shows how far some people are willing to go to in order to modify their looks, writes Noelle McCarthy

ARCHETYPES, aliens, eunuchs, cats. The subjects of Philip Toledano’s new book remind you of many things but not people, necessarily. Not people in any normal sense of the word anyway. This is perhaps the point of his project.

In his book, A New Kind of Beauty, the American photographer looks at the aging process and human mortality. It is a portfolio of images of men and women who have had cosmetic surgery. And not just a little cosmetic surgery. These are not people who have had a discreet brow-lift, or a tidy-up tummy tuck. Rather, they’ve submitted to the sort of surgery that changes your appearance radically. The sort of surgery that leaves you with a face like Joan Rivers, or a siamese cat. The sort of surgery that gives you breasts as big as your head.

Toledano looked for people who had undergone ‘extreme plastic surgery’. These are pictures of people who have remodelled their faces and bodies to such an extent that it is neither inaccurate nor insulting to say that some of them do not look human at all. They look like cubist paintings, and greek statuary, like dolls and Romulans. That is not to say they don’t look beautiful — dignity is one of the hallmarks of Toledano’s work, and all of these portraits have their own grace, but that doesn’t change the fact that these people are very unsettling to look at.

Consider Angel, who could be a girl or a boy, photographed topless using lighting that makes him look like a Caravaggio painting. The torso is that of a pre-pubescent boy, but the face and hair are pure Marilyn Monroe from the Some Like It Hot era. Marilyn with a touch of something else, actually. Something beautiful, but undoubtedly masculine. Angel looks like Marilyn Monroe, if Marilyn was somehow crossed with 1990s guitar hero Beck. A divine and preposterous amalgamation of ’50s starlet and male rock star, it’s a very strange image, but Angel at least looks human to some extent. Unlike ‘Steve’, who just looks like a cartoon.

All of Toledano’s portraits look vaguely classical, like Greek or Roman statues. Steve references ancient masculinity, with a well-built naked body, draped in a scarlet cloth. Extensive surgery, though, has given his face the creepy big-eyed look of a Troll doll or a Barbie.

He is completely altered-looking, totally artificial, but there’s something familiar in his artificiality. His built-up cheeks and bulging lips are reminiscent of some of the most popular actors and entertainers in the world, the stars who are stubbornly refusing to ‘go gentle into that good night’ of old age.

It’s been going on for years now, celebrities using plastic surgery to beat the ravages of time, or just change the features they dislike. Joan Rivers gets stick for having so much work done, but at least she has been honest about hating the way she looks. And it’s not like the rest of them aren’t at it as well. Nose jobs, brow lifts, cheek augmentation, jaw shaves. All common among Hollywood’s finest, along with a host of chemical procedures, the results of which can be even more alarming than what’s achieved with a scalpel. Restylane, fillers, plumpers, Botox. The list is endless, only rivalled by the number of stars who’ve taken advantage of the latest developments in cosmetic science. Much shorter is the list of those willing to be honest what they’ve had done. Micky Rourke did own up to innumerable surgeries, but looking at his poor face now, how could he deny them? Jennifer Aniston admits to a nose job, but only to correct a deviated septum. Twice. Nicole Kidman said she tried botox but she doesn’t use it anymore. Tell that to her immovable face.

Some A-list women have admitted to boob jobs, possibly because the results are harder to hide. Demi Moore went up several cup sizes and got her new bosom out in Striptease. Critics wished she hadn’t. Victoria Beckham said she got implants, but only admitted this after she had them taken out.

However discreet stars are about their surgery, it’s obvious that they’re having it. These days, it’s part of the job. Show business in the 21st century involves the augmentation of one’s body as well as fixing what doesn’t look right.

But as Toledano’s book demonstrates, this urge to hone and improve surgically isn’t just the preserve of stars. His images don’t just showcase the extremes of surgery, they pose a question as well. Are we engaged in the evolution of appearance? Is ‘a new kind of beauty’ being ushered in?

“An amalgam of surgery, art, and popular culture”, as the book calls it, that will take human attractiveness in a new direction altogether? If we are, then his portraits make a case for it, even better than Nicole’s unwrinkled brow, or Jennifer’s now-perfect nose. It’s hard to look at these serene beings with their hypnotic gazes and not be wowed.

The otherworldly proportions of their lips, breasts, cheeks and chins are strangely seductive. And we’re on the way there already, surely? Yvette’s huge, fake bosom reminds you of nothing so much as the massive, natural embonpoint of Christina Hendricks from Mad Men.

But is this really the new direction we want human beauty to take? We regularly hear tales of the misery that women are inflicting on themselves using cosmetic surgery. French actress Emmanuelle Beart and English sit-com star Leslie Ash were both honest enough to readily admit regretting their disastrous procedures. Both women admitted to plumping their lips up artificially, and both women say the resulting ‘trout pouts’ nearly destroyed their lives. Ash let her friend’s mother inject her with liquid silicone. It set like stone among her facial muscles, causing permanent disfigurement.

Beart was only 27 when she had her mouth done. This week she admitted to the procedure for the first time, calling it “a botched job” and telling journalists she was profoundly affected by the surgery, which she attributes now to a lack of confidence.

Ash likewise, says her decision to have her lips done was “pure vanity”. Here, then, is the issue with Toledano’s ‘new kind of beauty’; the place where it comes from. It is true that our bodies belong to us, and if we want to cut them and slice them, and change them and augment them, and pump them full of chemicals, we are free to do that. But how beautiful is it possible to feel if we’re changing our bodies because we feel miserable, or insecure?

A new smile won’t give you self-esteem, as Leslie and Emmanuelle have proven. As Joan Rivers will tell you, neither will a new face. Toledano’s portraits are fascinating and thought-provoking, but his new kind of beauty still comes up short against two old kinds of cliches. Chestnuts they may be, but they are also true. Beauty is only skin deep, and it’s what’s inside that counts, still.

* A New Kind of Beauty by Phillip Toledano is published by Dewi Lewis Publishing

Picture: Joan Rivers is one of the few stars to be open about her cosmetic surgery experiences.