Actress Calls Out Magazine After Photoshopping Cover Picture

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Lupita Nyong’o has spoken out about her disappointment after Grazia digitally altered her natural hair on their magazine cover.

The Academy Award winning actress expressed her dismay over Twitter, explaining how the weekly women’s mag had smoothed out her hair on the cover of their November issue.

Lupita posted the edited image – showing her with a smooth, cropped hairstyle – along with the original, untouched images where her long, curly hair is tied back in a ponytail.

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Lupita tweeted:

Disappointed that @GraziaUK edited out & smoothed my hair to fit a more Eurocentric notion of what beautiful hair looks like.

The 34-year-old 12 Years A Slave actress then took to Instagram to give the following full explanation:

As I have made clear so often in the past with every fiber of my being, I embrace my natural heritage and despite having grown up thinking light skin and straight, silky hair were the standards of beauty,

I now know that my dark skin and kinky, coily hair are beautiful too.

Being featured on the cover of a magazine fulfills me as it is an opportunity to show other dark, kinky-haired people, and particularly our children, that they are beautiful just the way they are.

She continued:

I am disappointed that @graziauk invited me to be on their cover and then edited out and smoothed my hair to fit their notion of what beautiful hair looks like.

Had I been consulted, I would have explained that I cannot support or condone the omission of what is my native heritage with the intention that they appreciate that there is still a very long way to go to combat the unconscious prejudice against black women’s complexion, hair style and texture.

Her fans on Twitter were quick to offer support and praise for the Kenyan-Mexican actress.

One person tweeted, ‘Here we go again. Another publication airbrushing out #BlackHair’.

Another said:

This is upsetting

Black hair comes in many forms and is beautiful every which way

LET US EMBRACE IT

Grazia have now offered the following official statement to Fader:

Grazia is committed to representing diversity throughout its pages and apologizes unreservedly to Lupita Nyong’o.

Grazia magazine would like to make it clear that at no point did they make any editorial request to the photographer for Lupita Nyong’o’s hair to be altered on this week’s cover, nor did we alter it ourselves.

But we apologize unreservedly for not upholding the highest of editorial standards in ensuring that that we were aware of all alterations that had been made.

In October this year, Solange Knowles called out the London Evening Standard for digitally altering her braids, posting a picture through Instagram with the caption ‘dtmh (don’t touch my hair) @eveningstandardmagazine’.

In the interview in question, Solange had described her braids as being an ‘act of beauty, an act of convenience and an act of tradition’ as well as ‘its own art form’.

Lupita Nyong’o is set to star as Nakia in Black Panther, which will open in US cinemas, 16 February 2018.

Julia Banim

Jules studied English Literature with Creative Writing at Lancaster University before earning her masters in International Relations at Leiden University in The Netherlands (Hoi!). She then trained as a journalist through News Associates in Manchester. Jules has previously worked as a mental health blogger, copywriter and freelancer for various publications.