Isabelle Caro, a French actress and model, whose emaciated image is a shock Italian ad campaign, has died at the age of 28.
In later interviews, Caro said she weighed about 59 pounds when the photos were taken in 2007, by Italian photographer Oliviero Toscani. The campaign gained Caro widespread attention in media in countries around Europe and in the United States, and she spoke out often about her anorexia, her efforts to recover, and the menace of eating disorders on the fashion industry.
Caro, who had reportedly struggled with anorexia since the age of 13, wrote a book published in France in 2008 titled, “The Little Girl Who Didn’t Want to Get Fat”.
The campaign featuring a skeletal Caro wasn’t without controversy, however, with many anorexia support groups claiming that the attention did a disservice to those who suffer from it. Caro’s image did appear on many pro-ana (pro anorexia) sites.
Will This Change Anything?
One would hope that a tragedy such as this would send shock waves through the industry and jar it into some meaningful action. Despite tragedies and other shock campaigns, however, it doesn’t appear that much has changed.
The 2006 anorexia-linked death of the Brazilian model, prompted efforts throughout the international fashion industry to address the health repercussions of using ultra-thin models, but no binding measures ensued.
French fashion industry representatives signed a government-backed charter in 2008, pledging not to encourage eating disorders, and to promote healthy body images by using “a diversity of body representations,” and not showing “images of people that could help promote a model of extreme thinness.”
Industry executives the world over have refused to cooperate.
Writing about this has made me feel truly sad. Making wholesale changes to an industry steeped in a culture of bone-thin will not come overnight, but one can only hope that tragic situations like this will change some minds.
What are your thoughts on the situation?
In today’s society, there is implied image of “you’ll only be loved if you’re beautiful.” Just go to your local book store or super market and pick up a magazine, look at the models and what do you see? Lies. Beautiful, curvy, thin, lies. Thanks to technology we have become views on reality have become distorted. I guess that is why I love the music video “Everybody’s Fool” by Evanescence so much. I posted to links below. The first one is gives a behind the scenes look that reveals the secret of these so called ‘role models.’ The second link is the music video that I mention before.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhgoGfnD8sc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u55fpsbzAfk
This is not really related to the article – it is entirely an emotional response generated by your comment. You say you are the mother of five children and still struggle with your eating disorder. I am not trying to insult your parenting or your children/family or anything else, but I wonder about how your disorder might affect your children. Or if they even know you have one. It strikes deep with me because my mother is currently dying from complications of bulimia. She looks exactly like, if not worse than, Isabelle Caro did, and I can tell you that has … messed me up, obviously. I guess what I’m getting at is – good for you for fighting your battle, I hope you continue to do well and I pray that your children never go through what I am going through.
NO, really NO ANOREXIC GIRL will blame society and fashion for this disease! Yes, it’s a disease and it’s due to psychological problems. The girls do have a distorted self-image. They don’t go like “oh, this girl on the catwalk looks so skinny, I’ll go anorexic”. It’s not like that.
I think You are right !!!!!
I agree Val. This is an extremely sad story.That’s so incredibly sad. I also agree that we can’t blame the fashion industry entirely for the death of Isabelle Caro. Anorexia is as much a mental illness as it is a physical manifestation. It has little to do with wanting to look “good”; in fact, many anorexics DO hate looking like skeletons.
I had and still do struggle with bulemia. It is not all about image, a lot of girls use it as a form of control. Unless you hvae lived through it or are living with it… You have no idea what eating disorders do to you. Not just the mental aspect but the medical physical and emotional parts as well. No matter how much therapy you go through…there are things that cannot be controlled in your life and the switch is flipped and you right back where you don’t want to be. I am a 41 yo woman with 5 children and I am a professional chef but no matter how hard I work for it, there it is just waiting in the wings. The wrong thing being said, the sense of no contol over life… it overwhelms me and my dirty little secret comes back to haunt me. I started when I was 17 and I am still using it as a coping mechanisim… Just thought you should hear from someone other than a person using it to be skinny!
I agree Val. This is an extremely sad story. I have seen documentaries with her and I have followed her stories for the last couple years and was very hurt when I heard of her passing. I have her book on order now just to hear the rest of her story. However, as sad as it is, I believe it is a rare case. Most woman have enough self control to not let themselves become like this. Most models wouldn’t sacrifice their health just to book a job. Unless there was an inner struggle and an inner issue that needed attention. Val is right, most agencies don’t go for this look. Maybe there is a few loopy, creative Italian designers who like that look, but most do not favor this. I think it is necessary for her to stand up and expose those who feed off of this disease, however. Most people can recognize the problem and those who may have booked her because of her look, or those who told her “you’re too fat”, only promoted her problem. Maybe if she would have had just a few more agencies turn her down and a few more people tell her, “you need help”, “‘ill help you”, she would still be with us.
Thank you Jim! I worked as a model for 6 years and hate the way that the media demonises it. I’m healthy, I eat well – I have never experienced (or heard of) anybody telling me to lose weight or eat less, and I’m a UK size 10/US size 5-6.
Fashion models are naturally skinny – anorexics are in the minority, and generally do not book much work because they start to look awful and nobody wants to be associated with it (which probably makes matters worse for them). They are skinny because clothes look better on that frame.
As for the recent outrage – the ‘perfect’ stats for fashion models (34-24-34) haven’t changed in decades. The general public has got bigger and bigger, which is why the difference seems greater in the last few years. Size 0 is a modern invention due to vanity sizing. The usual reply to this is ‘Marilyn Monroe was a size 14′ – yes, she was. Her stats were 36-22-36 – not that far off a modern fashion model.
My daughter showed me this website where a girl talks about her eating disorder struggles http://www.stillduckling.wordpress.com. It is really graphic and disturbing but so honest too. This girl really pours her heart out. It breaks my heart and reminds me to watch my daughters’ habits and moods.
I watched the movie “picture me”, a documentary about models and the fashion industry and at a lot of fashion shows girls do cocain back stage and the toilets are clogged with vomit and diarrhea so it’s common knowledge to the designer, stylist, models and all the people involved in fashion, that most girls aren’t naturally that skinny..
And still nothing is done to change this, that is really, really sad
That is really sad. A group of medical researchers also said that magazines displaying of models’ “photoshop edited” pictures also invite a massive number of young women to lose weight badly enough to lead to anorexia.
Ward
Unfortunately the media does impact body image but how we interpret that is up to each of us individually. Many of us feel so unworthy & flawed that these images serve to confirm our inadequacies.
As a recovered Anorexic I don’t identify with these images any more and it’s liberating to know that I don’t have to measure up to any standard that I don’t set for myself.
My passion is working with women who want to change how they feel about their bodies through strategies based in self-awareness & fitness. Giving back in this way is not only rewarding for me but it is hopefully helping to change our dysfunctional culture. Live fit. Be real!! Julia – positivelyfitbody.com
Though the billboard Isabelle Caro posed for at 59 lbs was both horrifying and heartbreaking (and her young death at the age of 28 very sad), I find myself mostly angry at the lack of outrage at the glorification–still–of an unrealistic body image for our young women.
We continue to applaud, reward, and allow women to become role models whose own lifestyles encourage young girls to hate their own bodies and strive to be like those we make into celebrities:
• Model Kate Moss-keeping her weight down with cigarettes and cocaine,
• Heidi Montag, on the cover of magazines for her self-mutilation using extreme plastic surgery,
• The Ashley Twins, both so thin they had to be hospitalized for eating disorders, and yet are still hailed as ‘”Queens of Fashion”,
• Kiera Knightly whose bones jut out of her skin stars in commercials with backless dresses flaunting her every countable vertebrae.
This problem is nothing new. Even former First Lady, Nancy Reagan is frail and bent with osteoporosis–a condition exacerbated by a well-document life of extreme dieting.
At Camp Shane we have seen our share of girls and young women arrive–bright, beautiful and full of life–hating themselves enough that they have tried to starve themselves into becoming someone else…one of these stick-figure idols.
Some have even flirted with the pro-ana sites mentioned in the blog (where girls compete and cheer each other on for how little they can eat. Drinking only a diet soda a day is greeted with cheers by the poor sick girls on these sites.) Little do they realize, they a face a future not only with non-elastic skin, early wrinkles, and dried hair, but permanently weakened bones, disrupted menstruation, reproduction issues, poor blood circulation, kidney and liver disease, and worse–even death as poor Isabelle Caro discovered recently.
Our society must start promoting another concept of female beauty: Clear skin, glowing eyes, developed muscles, and enough body fat to keep our bodies healthy and able to see us through a whole long life should be the measure of what we consider beautiful. Women with these physical characteristics must become our ideals or else we are giving up our young girls to a bleak –and much shortened– future.
I call upon fashion designers, magazine editors, the modeling industry, and the TV and film industries to lead the way and turn this deadly game around, before we lose another generation.
Ziporah Janowski, Owner Camp Shane and Shane Diet Resorts
I went through an eating disorder from age 14 to about 21. I don’t feel like getting much into it, but it all started around the time my grades were slipping and I was with a very abusive boyfriend that my parents did nothing about. I personally can’t blame the fashion industry for what started it all for me. But everyone is different; I don’t think it should be overlooked as a contributing factor for some cases.
Mitch, I spoke about this once before on this site…
Apparently mens percpetion of eating disorders is the “skeletal” woman.
They seem to not realize that the skeletal look is just a symptom of advance eating disorder related breakdown of the body.
Sure guys don’t find skeletal women attractive. But they don’t realize that many of the women they DO find attractive are in less grave stages of eating disorders.
That cute figure you DO like may be eating disorder induced. It just hasn’t reached the skeletal point.
That’s so incredibly sad. I also agree that we can’t blame the fashion industry entirely for the death of Isabelle Caro. Anorexia is as much a mental illness as it is a physical manifestation. It has little to do with wanting to look “good”; in fact, many anorexics DO hate looking like skeletons. They are tormented inside and they use food as a way to attempt to control their emotions. I personally find it sick that anyone, especially a photographer, would photograph someone who is obviously ill and try to promote that image as being somehow desirable or even attainable to people. It’s like exploitation of some sort.
I think that’s a valid point. It’s a psychiatric disorder in which certain enviroments add fuel to the fire. The modelling industry is but one such vehicle and should be doing what they can to fight against it and not with it.
I question whether you can blame the fashion industry. Anorexia is a psychiatric disorder that runs so much deeper than how you look.
Welcome to our world.
Wow…if she was bald, I’d swear she was a concentration camp survivor. So sad and so unnecessary.
Anorexia, and other eating disorder, aren’t about what men find attractive. It’s a psychological problem surrounding one’s perception of one’s own body. If eating disorders were solved by simply saying “don’t you know you look unattractive?”, a lot of money would be saved on treatment centers and hospital bills. Newflash: women have other things going on in their life than thinking about how men see them.
That is so sad. So sad. Poor girl. I will never forget something my grandpa told me when I expressed as a child that I wanted to be a model when I grew up. He said “huh?! you want to look like a walking hanger?”.
I don’t think the fashion industry will ever clean up its act. As a person myself who sews it is so much easier sewing straight lines and not having to account for any curves. That is a half joke.
I don’t get it. Are there guys out here attracted to women who look like skeletons? The fashion industry needs to clean its act up.
… and on the same page, under Favourites, “The world`s fattest woman`s race against time…”