Instead of hiring the black models who were glaringly absent from the Fashion Week runway and rarely appear in global campaigns, Numéro Magazine chose a white 16 year-old girl for their “AfricanQueen” editorial whose face they painted black.
According to Jezebel:
Here’s 16-year-old white model Ondria Hardin; she’s doused in a very deep bronze in an editorial for Numéro magazine called “African Queen”. Ugh. Foudre makes the excellent point/sums it up with, “why hire a black model when you could just paint a white one!”
Adding insult to injury, several black models are signed to the very agency that represents Ondria Hardin yet they were passed over for a shoot that purports to acknowledge African culture.
It’s appalling that instead of just hiring a black model, a magazine could be willing to go to the extreme of painting a white model darker and dressing her in printed clothing and bold jewelry to channel an “African queen.” The result is almost a mockery of blackness instead of a true celebration of it. Imagine a black girl, painted in white face, in a photo-shoot entitled "European Queen". I see nothing African or Queenlike about that sorry excuse for a photo. Bottom line is we cannot look to racist to respect the beauty of blackness, we need to create our own glossy mags, celebrating the beautiful people that we know ourselves to be. Shame on you Numero Mag. I'll never buy or support such a magazine and I am even sorry that I might be helping to promote it, by bringing attention to this issue.
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