Featuring another longtime muse, Valentina Zelyaeva

Oct 16, 2009 13:46 GMT  ·  By
Model Valentina Zelyaeva appears to have an extremely distorted body in Ralph Lauren ad from Sydney
   Model Valentina Zelyaeva appears to have an extremely distorted body in Ralph Lauren ad from Sydney

It’s only a few days ago that Polo Ralph Lauren came under serious fire – and some serious mockery as well – for an ad that appeared in a mall in Japan, showing Filippa Hamilton with a waist and hips smaller than her head in what was deemed the biggest “photoshop flop” in the industry. A new ad has surfaced, this time in Sydney, Australia, featuring Valentina Zelyaeva, who is also retouched to an inch of her life, as StyleList informs.

The problem is that, when the Hamilton ad surfaced and started making the rounds on the Internet, Ralph Lauren immediately responded that it was an “anomaly” that somehow happened, no matter how much the company tried to project a healthy image of the models without photoshopping them too much. If the latest photo is any indication, it could very well be that distorting models’ bodies until they look as if about to drop dead of starvation any second is actually common practice, the aforementioned e-zine says.

“In the new ad, Zelyaeva is shown in an all-grey ensemble, with her head, shoulders and hands seemingly normal, but her torso, hips and legs slimmed to impossible – and pretty unattractive – proportions. Unfortunately, with these two images popping up in far flung corners of the globe, we’d hate (but obviously, sort of love) to see what else is floating around out there.” StyleList writes.

As also noted above, Ralph Lauren initially moved to take legal action against the websites that had the distorted picture of Hamilton up. Then, presumably on second thought, it issued an apology saying that it was not the company’s policy to make models look ultra-thin and thus send the wrong message to female buyers and women in general. It also claimed that was an isolated incident. Days later, Hamilton herself went public to say that she had been fired from Ralph Lauren for being “too large,” and that it happened before they retouched her picture in such a ridiculous manner, as we also reported.

“I saw my face in this extremely skinny girl – which is not me. It makes me sad. It makes me think that Ralph Lauren wants to have this kind of image – and it’s not healthy, it’s not right. And it’s not a good example. When you see this picture young women will look at this and think it’s normal, and it’s not. I think they owe American women an apology, a big apology. I’m very proud of what I look like, and I think a role model should look healthy.” Hamilton said about the photo in question.

As of now, neither Ralph Lauren nor Valentina Zelyaeva has made any comment on the situation. Zelyaeva, just like Hamilton before she was fired, is also a longtime Lauren muse.