Over-the-top chanteuse Nicki Minaj can be controversial at times, but she’s always outspoken and never shy about giving her opinion. This time she’s firing back at ESPN Magazine, which she claims retouched her photos and elongated her forehead.
The before and after photos are available for perusal, and to most, it seems hard to tell whether ESPN Magazine changed the shape of Minaj’s head for the final photo. But Minaj presumably knows her forehead much more intimately than the rest of us, and she’s not pleased with the look they gave her for the cover. She posted a photo of the cover to her Instagram account, captioning the photo “when retouching goes wrong.”
She followed up with some candids and untouched photos that detailed exactly why she was unhappy. She stated that she was thrilled with her untouched shots and that her forehead seemed to have grown in the final versions. Whether or not her forehead looks bigger–some can’t really tell the difference–ESPN Magazine has issued a statement saying that how her forehead looks on the cover is how it looks in the studio, and that minimal, if any, retouching was done.
While her music and her looks sometimes seem a little outlandish, the cover itself is gorgeous, as is Minaj herself. She’s perfectly made up, and beaming in a very high-fashion outfit, her blonde locks flowing down her back in a silky wave. She’s gorgeous in both the untouched and final photos, but the “Superbass” singer has made it clear that she’s not a fan of retouching. Miss Minaj has been outspoken in the past about how happy she is with her look–even going so far as to say she felt naked in a past “makeunder” shoot where she toned down the makeup and hair, yet still looked flawless–so it kind of makes sense that retouching would ruffle her brightly colored feathers.
It’s safe to say there was probably some retouching going on before the cover hit newsstands. However, both the untouched and final photos are so flawless, any retouching was probably minimal at most. Whatever the case, Minaj looks gorgeous next to Kobe Bryant on the cover, and we’re floored once again at how flawlessly put-together she is in both sets of photos. Miss Minaj will always have something to say about her appearance, and it’s unfortunate she’s not particularly pleased about the cover because she looks fabulous.