Were The Women In Dove's "Real Women" Campaign Re-Touched?

A new controversy over Dove's "Campaign for real beauty" ads is brewing as questions arise over the "pureness" of the images of women in the ad.

The photographs of women of all sizes could have been significantly retouched, claims airbrush artist Pascal Dangin in an article in the May 12 issue of the New Yorker. The artist claims that he retouched the photo of women in their underwear used in one of the campaign's earliest executions.

The New Yorker article was clearly not an expose on Dove, but a story about the mastery of Dangin as a re-touching artist. That said, there is this excerpt which is causing a stir: "It turned out that it was a Dangin job. 'Do you know how much retouching was on that?' he asked. 'But it was great to do, a challenge, to keep everyone's skin and faces showing the mileage but not looking unattractive'."

If the allegations are proved to be true it could be very damaging to Dove's four-year campaign and to its ad agency Ogilvy & Mather.

Brand Republic says that: It would be particularly hypocritical following Dove's popular viral video 'Dove Evolution', which shows an attractive but bare-faced woman transformed with make-up, styling and retouching into a stunning model. It ends with the line "no wonder our perception of beauty is distorted".

Controversy to continue...