Women make ugly faces for contest

Photo by Colin Conces
Photos of women making ugly faces were displayed at the Skutt Student Center as part of Make-A-Face, a contest sponsored by the Women’s Empowerment Base.

By ANN STACY
Reporter

Their lifespan is usually less than five minutes. They survive long enough for someone to see them, say, “Gross!” and press delete. They are bad photographs.

But during the Women’s Empowerment Base’s Make-a-Face contest that ran from April 10 to Tuesday, these photographs made it off the digital camera and onto posters on campus.

Katrina Koclanes, Arts & Sciences junior and one of four WEB founders, said the contest was a self-confidence campaign.

“It gave women an opportunity to be silly and ridiculous, and show a side that they wouldn’t normally show,” she said. “And to do it in a public way so others could see it.”

Women had opportunities to get their pictures taken or to submit a photo making the ugliest or goofiest face they could to show self-confidence for the contest.

Bev Lukawski, the first-place winner, received a spa package to Absolute Serenity Day Spa in Omaha, which the company donated. Katelyn Cherney, the second-place winner, received a certificate to the Absolute Serenity Day Spa, which the Lieben Center for Women and the Women’s and Gender Studies Program funded through donations.

Katie Welsh, apartment coordinator for Opus Hall, graduate student and another WEB founder, said approximately 150 women participated in the contest; a panel of five judges chose the winners. Judging was based on whether participants used all their facial features, were original and showed self-confidence in their photographs. WEB announced the winners at a self-confidence reception on Wednesday night and displayed all the photos.

The idea for the contest came from Cherney, Arts & Sciences junior and another WEB founder. Cherney said the idea came to her after two incidents with friends.

The first was when she posted an up-close photograph of her friend’s face on Facebook. Cherney said although it was a beautiful photograph, her friend de-tagged it and said she thought it looked like she had crows’ feet.

“Women don’t want to show blemishes or really their human side,” Cherney said.

The second incident was when one of Cherney’s friends took pictures of his friends to see who could make the ugliest face, which gave her the idea to have an event that would address a body image issue and allow women to show self-confidence.
“It was really nice to celebrate bodies in a positive light instead of focusing on the negative things people do to their bodies,” Welsh said.

Cherney said when she worked at the contest booths, the need to follow through with the contest’s focus became increasingly obvious.

“Women would agree to be in the contest, but if you look at the pictures, some didn’t take risks,” she said. “It became clear that women are still afraid to go out on a limb and make themselves look ugly.”

WEB received some criticism that they did not open the contest to men. Cherney said although WEB respected this criticism, it made a deliberate decision to aim its efforts at women.
However, WEB does have male members and encourages men to support and join the group, which became an official campus organization this February. Cherney said WEB’s aim is to show that feminism is not just for women.

“It’s important to re-educate the campus on what it means to be a feminist,” she said. “It’s not just about equality for women; it’s about equality for everyone.”

The contest was WEB’s first event, and Koclanes and Cherney said there will be more to come, including the Make-a-Face contest next year.

“We can take it farther and have it be more educational,” Koclanes said. “It definitely has a lot of potential.”