It’s been a while since one specific pose dominated the internet. Unlike fashion trends, which currently have a life cycle shorter than a mayfly, facial poses actually tend to stick around for a while.
If passing through a moratorium of selfie poses circa 2000 onwards, you would see ‘Here lies Duckface, 2007 to 2013,’ followed by ‘RIP Peace Fingers, 2013 to 2020’ and that would be about it. There are obviously fleeting phases which don’t quite permeate the trend cycle — boys posing with their thumb and forefinger in a V shape around the chin area really posed a threat in 2009 — but they need some proper staying power to last multiple years. And since peace fingers moved from sincere to ironic around 2019, we’ve all been at a bit of a loss when it comes to selfie poses.
But then, in 2022, i-D sounded the alarm: something was coming. Writer Rayne Fisher-Quann had noticed a new pose emerging amongst the chicest and coolest of Gen Z, which they dubbed the ‘Dissociative Pout’. Its hallmarks are as follows: dead eyes, expressionless lips and the overall aura of a particularly photogenic corpse.
It was embodied in people from the TikTok generation; the likes Addison Rae, Enya Umanzor, Chloe Cherry et al. “If duckface was a girlboss who got down on the weekends, the dissociative pout is a detached feminist with an ironic meme page,” Fisher-Quann observed.
While the duckface and peace sign poses signalled happiness or at least some degree of enjoyment, this new model-esque pose was the first It-Pose in ages to feature its wearer looking actively disengaged and uninterested.
Now, in 2023, we have reached its full form: less dissociative and more actively moody, to the point of cosplaying a teenager who just had their phone confiscated. It’s personified perfectly by Rachel Sennott, who’s tipped to become the actress of the summer thanks to her role in HBOs buzzy, controversial new series The Idol, as well as lesbian fight club comedy flick Bottoms.
Sennott is rarely pictured without her signature pout, bottom lip protruding over-dramatically, doe-eyes looking up at the camera like it just told her off, regardless of whatever lavish situation she might be in. All dolled up for the red carpet of Cannes festival? Moody pout. Being photographed for Calvin Klein? Moody pout. Posing poolside on holiday with friends? Moody pout. At a wedding? Moody pout. Sat on the bed at a chic looking hotel? A Rachel Sennott classic: moody pout.
It’s not dissimilar from the look of dissociative pout founde Euphoria actress Chloe Cherry, who herself has moved from dissociation to full on tantrum in recent months (she’s even crying in one of her latest Instagram posts). So why do we all want to look like we’re in a full-blown sulk all of a sudden?
Some blame the “vibe shift,” a term popularised by New York magazine writer Allison P. Davis’ 2022 article where she predicted a drastic incoming change of aesthetic and taste. But the first person to really coin ‘vibe shift’ was Sean Monahan (the same guy that coined ‘normcore’), who wrote about it in his Substack, 8ball, way back in 2021. Monahan, who also spoke to New York Magazine about his theory, predicted “the return of early-aughts indie sleaze. American Apparel, flash photography at parties, and messy hair and messy makeup.” The perfect setting for a puffed-out bottom lip and pleading pair of doe eyes, then, right?
In another interview with fashion writer Amy Odell, Monahan compares the vibe shift to a moment from The Andy Warhol Diaries: “In one of the episodes — and I’m paraphrasing here — Andy Warhol talks about how a couple years into a new decade, things start to look and feel different. The quote is something like, ‘There’ll be new people and new faces and it takes a couple years into a decade for things to really get going. And that’s when you decide who’s going to make it into the future and who’s going to be relegated to the past.’ And I feel like that’s a bit what 2022 was for a lot of people, this realisation that the last decade is over.”
So if 2022 was the realisation year (not to be confused with 2016, the year of realising things, as per the omniscient Kylie Jenner) and the advent of the dissociative pout, 2023 is the year of the moody pout. It needed a while to evolve, but now it’s time: get ready for everyone on your Instagram feed to start looking thoroughly unhappy all the time. But don’t worry guys, it’s chic!
