What messages is this "fashion" advertisement truly portraying?

This image is an excellent example of how an advertisement for a certain product has the ability to send other messages to its audience. When thinking about and looking at an ad, it is important to discuss and realize the linguistic message, the denoted iconic message, and the connoted iconic message. Thinking of these three components in an image will allow the consumer to truly realize what is being displayed in the advertisement. The linguistic message is the actual writing on the advertisement. In this example the linguistic message is:

SISLEY

FASHION JUNKIE

This writing conveys that this is a fashion ad. Perhaps the dress is supposedly supposed to be the focal point of the image. For most viewers, however, the emaciated models seemingly doing lines of cocaine off the table is probably more eye catching.

The denoted iconic message is the item or person stripped of meaning. So, in this example the dress, the women, the credit card, or the table would be denoted iconic messages. They are the physical objects that one sees in the image.

Perhaps the most important aspect is the connoted iconic message. This message argues everything behind the raw people or objects in the advertisement. In this example the connoted iconic messages could be along the lines of drug use, eating disorders, drug addicts, decadence, superficiality, and sickliness. The models both look strung out and high on something, presumably cocaine. They also look skeletal and probably either anorexic, bulimic, or both. The dress is barely even featured in this advertisement. If a viewer were to look at this image without the writing, they might think the ad was promoting a nightclub or an illegal underground drug club. Decadence and superficiality are portrayed because of the credit card and the dress. The image may encourage the audience to think along the lines of, "If I look like this or participate in these activities I will have a glamorous and fast paced exciting life". Unfortunately, nothing about this advertisement is healthy or normal. Images like this are powerful and hurtful to consumers and should probably be banned from being published.