In connection with this week’s readings, here’s a couple of pictures that were part of a controversial advertisement campaign conducted in the 1990s by the Italian photographer Oliviero Toscani for the fashion brand Benetton. Toscani has come to be well known for the shocking pictures employed to shock the viewer on social issues, and themes such as racism, homophobia, imperialism, and so forth. Some of them had become popular (and controversial) not only in Europe, but also in the US.

I was reminded of these two specific photographs because they both subvert the idea of “the loving touch of the white child” that, according to Bernstein’s reading of Uncle Tom’s Cabin, “restores Topsy to humanity, natural Christianity, and childhood.” (45)

In addition, I see the second picture as an explicit mockery to racial prejudice, suggesting it does not belong to the innocent realm of children. This representation clearly relies on a Romantic view of childhood, as also suggested by the apparently harmless nudity and asexuality of the subjects (the gender of the children does not appear clear to me in neither of these pictures) . The embrace clearly implies complicity and mutual protection, whereas the grin on the white child is an element of the depiction that attracts me and yet leaves me puzzled. I came up with two different readings for this and I would love to hear your opinion on them, or your personal interpretations if you come with a different ones. At first I thought of it as a mockery of the kids’ appearance, as an evil grin suggesting the naughty nature of the little angel, in clear opposition to the harmlessness of the little devil-looking child. At a second glance, though, it seemed to me more like a defiant grin, a mockery to the racial prejudices of the adult world (the intended audience of the picture indeed).

By the way, you can find more of Toscani’s campaigns here http://www.repubblica.it/cultura/2014/08/08/foto/oliviero_toscani_le_campagne_pubblicitarie_pi_provocatorie-93430769/1/#1 (the website is in Italian, but the pictures are quite eloquent) and an an interview with him here http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/europe/08/13/oliviero.toscani/index.html .