Serena Williams has, quite rightly, been named GQ magazine’s Woman of the Year.
But there’s one small problem with her magazine cover that’s getting people up in arms.
The magazine made the design decision to put quote marks around the word woman.
Which, in hindsight, maybe someone should have rethought. Many have considered the choice offensive, especially given that the tennis champion has faced cruel taunts about having “masculine” strength throughout her career.
However, it seems there may have been a good reason (well, a reason at least) for the quote marks being placed around “woman”.
As social media users pointed out, the 37-year-old has been wearing the designs of US fashion designer Virgil Abloh – who created a line for Nike specifically for her to wear during the 2018 US Open. (Remember that tutu?)
And here’s where context is key. Virgil, who’s also an artistic director at Louis Vuitton, has his own label Off-white, which lately has been putting quote marks around everything. The Nike shoes Serena wore on court also had quotation marks around the word “air”.
And it’s Virgil’s handwriting that the word “woman” is written in.
It’s a design choice that, with context, makes sense, but without it, looks really bad.
Other Twitter users pointed out that the controversy could have been overcome if the cover had Virgil’s handwriting for the entire Woman of The Year phrase.
GQ tried to give the cover context in their tweet about the cover, but it wasn’t quite clear enough.
The magazine has a history of not making the wisest decisions when it comes to their Woman of The Year cover.
In 2012, the cover featured Lana Del Rey completely naked. She was carefully posed of course, but what readers had a problem with was that the three Men of The Year were fully clothed in suits.
What do you think? Should GQ have rethought the quote marks?
Top Comments
Isn’t GQ kind of famous for having naked women/clothed men on their covers? Seriously, do a Google Image search, the huge majority of women will be at least semi naked or posing provocatively, and the huge majority of men will be in snazzy suits. The word in quotes is stupid, and if the explanation is that it’s the deisgner’s style, they’ve gone about it in a very ham-fisted kind of way.
It's a magazine for men based around style and culture. Makes sense to have those sorts of images on the front cover.
The word in quotes is without context, it isn't stupid.
Controversy around Lana Del Ray being expected to pose nude while the men were not is reasonable. I can't think of even a slightly possible explanation or context for them to all be dressed and her to be nude.
On the other hand, while I can see where people could initially be upset or confused by the use of "woman" on the cover, the only way you could stay angry once it's explained is to completely ignore the context and pretty much be looking for something to be upset about.
Can I get upset about a designer abusing grammar and totally mis-using quotation marks? That in itself is irritating - if they were used correctly there would be no need to have the "art" explained to us in the first place!
Yep, I'm with you there. I mean I know art is subjective and all that, but whacking some quotation marks either side of someone else's pre-existing work seems a bit much.
If that's cool, I've got some quotation marks to put around some Warhol's and I'm gonna be rich!
"I can't think of even a slightly possible explanation or context for them to all be dressed and her to be nude."
There are certain gentleman's clubs where circumstances like that have been known to arise. Possibly just in the northern hemisphere, from what I've read.
In the southern hemisphere if you're into that sort of thing you have to make do with the magazines that come in plastic bags at the servo.