Why Was FKA Twigs’s Calvin Klein Ad Banned in the U.K.?
Something strange is going on over in the United Kingdom. One of the country’s regulatory agencies has outright banned a recent Calvin Klein campaign starring FKA Twigs over concerns that the advert displayed the singer as a “stereotypical sexual object” by focusing on her “physical features.”
The Advertising Standards Authority, which regulates such matters, announced that the advertisement “was irresponsible and likely to cause serious offense” and effectively pulled it from circulation. In the image called into question, Twigs is captured by photographers Mert and Marcus Piggott in a draped denim shirt beneath the text “Calvins or nothing.”
Seemingly because of the artist’s partially exposed side profile, the regulator asserted that the “image's composition placed viewers' focus on the model's body rather than on the clothing being advertised.”
Two other images from the same campaign, of a scantily clad Kendall Jenner, were also called into question by the ASA but “were unlikely to be seen as irresponsible or cause serious or widespread offense on the basis of objectification,” per the agency.
You might be thinking, Hasn’t Calvin Klein been doing this for years? Yes. And the American brand pushed back on the ASA’s ruling in recent filings. According to ASA's ruling summary, the label noted that “the ads were similar to ads they had been publishing in the U.K. for many years” and in its view “did not overly sexualise Kendall Jenner or FKA Twigs and were not irresponsible.”
The brand continued, stating, “The images were not vulgar and were of two confident and empowered women who had chosen to identify with the Calvin Klein brand.”
We’d also like to point out that shots of the campaign’s male stars, Aaron Taylor Johnson and Michael B. Jordan, didn’t raise any eyebrows over at the Advertising Standards Authority. The agency did admit in its ruling that the images of Twigs and Jenner are “part of a wider campaign that also included images of well-known men,” but said that “not all of the ads in the campaign were displayed together” and were assessed “under investigation on the merits of their individual content.” Very interesting!
The American powerhouse just released another blockbuster advertisement starring The Bear actor Jeremy Allen White in various states of undress, so it’ll be interesting to see if the U.K. gets its knickers in a twist over that one too.
