Whitney Thompson has stripped bare in a bid to get women to love their bodies - no matter what their size is. The full figured model, who won season ten of the hit U.S. show, America's Next Top Model, poses naked with a fellow plus size model, Chenese Lewis for an ad for Love Your Body Day. Thompson, who is an ambassador for the National Eating Disorders Association, will also act as a celebrity host for the event which will be held on October 23.
Thompson has also stepped in to defend America's Next Top Model's host Tyra Banks who was embroiled in controversy recently after she was seen putting her hands around the waist of an extremely thin contestant on the latest series of the show.
'Tyra supports women of all sizes as long as they are healthy,' she says. 'I do not fault her reaction to seeing such a tiny waist. 'Tyra remains a leading figure in the fight for body equality in the fashion industry.'
Banks, who in her prime was a leading supermodel and Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition cover girl has famously struggled herself with weight. Four years ago the former Victoria's Secret beauty gained 30 lbs and faced stinging headlines such as 'America's Next Top Waddle' after photographs of her looking bigger in a bathing suit appeared in magazines.She swiftly came out in defense of curvy women at the time, saying on The Tyra Banks Show: 'To all of you who have something nasty to say to me or to women built like me. I have one thing to say to you: Kiss my fat a**!"
Five plus size models competed on Next Top Model before Thompson, but she was the first to win the coveted prize of a contract with Elite Model Management, a $100,000 contract with Cover Girl cosmetics and a six page spread and cover in Seventeen Magazine.Banks is so committed to introducing body diversity into the notoriously thin dominated model industry that she is launching a new model competition focusing solely on plus size teens.
Any girls between the ages of 13 and 19 are invited to enter as long as they have a dress size between 12 and 20 and are between 5'9" and 6'1" in height.
'I've always felt it was my mission to expand the narrow perceptions of beauty,' Banks said to Us magazine.
The top model went on to say that she has always tried to 'challenge industry and universal standards' by 'celebrating non-traditional beauty' and stressing the importance of inner beauty.
Banks also said she was disappointed that the term 'plus-sized' had such a negative connotation, and that really, it just referred to the average American woman.
'That woman is healthy, fit and beautiful,' says Banks.
'Adolescence is such an impressionable time in a young woman's life, and I hope this contest helps teen girls discover their own beauty from the inside out.'
No comments:
Post a Comment