Embracing our so-called "imperfections" is a big part of the body positivity movement. While that is something we should all be doing, I'll admit, it's a difficult thing to do. Especially when it comes to this little thing called acne (aka ruiner of lives and destroyer of dreams).
If you've ever suffered from chronic acne, or just woken up in the morning with a pimple the size of Rhode Island inhabiting your face, then you'll know that embracing it is the last thing we want to do. We pull and pop them, slather them with blemish-fighting toners and medicines, and spend way too much time attempting to hide them away under thick layers of concealer.
But French artist Marie-Anne Tutti decided to take a different approach. Instead of concealing her blemishes, the 25-year-old children's book author is using art to show that imperfections are beautiful.
Tutti got the idea when looking at her blemishes in the mirror, and noticed that they resembled the Big Dipper. "I thought it would be fun to connect the dots,” she told Cosmo. “I found the result very pretty and I wanted to do it again.”
The result is actually quite cool, and shows that even though society (and especially beauty companies) wants us to cover up our imperfections, it doesn't mean we have to!
To get the look, Tutti uses silver and blue eyeliner to literally just connect the dots in whatever patterns she sees, and completes it with mathcing eyeliner on her eyes. Doing this gave Tutti "a sense of control over her skin’s appearance—and a way to embrace its natural state." It just so happens that many of the patterns Tutti finds look like constellations, giving her a literal "galaxy" look.
There's such a huge stigma that tells us acne is something to be ashamed of (why I don't know, because there's usually not much anyone can do to change it). While acne is usually associated with those dreaded adolescent years, it affects adults too, which makes lots of people feel like they have to cover up their skin in order to look "normal."
Our appearance, and especially our skin, does not define who we are. Instead of focusing on covering up what we consider to be "bad," what if we all embraced our natural look, including our blemishes? That would be liberating.
