Teh Mysterious Math Behind the Brazilian Butt Lift
The quest for the “ideal” female form hasโค fueled a booming industry in cosmetic surgery,and nowhere is this more evident than in the world โof buttock augmentation.While โoften associated with Brazil, the foundations of this practise – and the surprisingly rigid standards defining a desirable posterior – were laid โdecades ago in Mexico City.โ It began withโ surgeon โMario โGonzรกlez-Ulloa,โข whoโ in the 1960s first implanted โsilicone designed specifically for the buttocks. He earned the title “grandfather โคof buttock augmentation” according to the textbook Body Sculpting with Silicone Implants.
By the early 2000s,โ a new generation โฃof surgeons were refining the โขart, most notably โRamรณn Cuenca-Guerra. โIn a 2004 paper, “Whatโข Makes Buttocks Beautiful?” Cuenca-Guerra attemptedโข to codify attractiveness, โoutlining four characteristics that “determineโข attractive buttocks” and identifying fiveโ distinct “defects” with corresponding corrective strategies. He even categorized a particular downturnโ asโฃ “defect type 5,” the “senile buttock,”โฃ visuallyโ contrasted in Gonzรกlez-Ulloa’s work with the “happy buttock”-high, rounded, and โdimpled.
However, the methodology behind these determinations proved unsettling. Cuenca-Guerra’s standards weren’t born from global consensus, butโ from subjective judgment. His research involved presenting 1,320 photographs of nude โฃwomen aged 20 to 35, viewed from behind, to aโฃ panel of just sixโ plastic surgeons. These surgeons “pointed โขout which buttocks they โคconsidered attractive โคand harmonious, and features on which this attractiveness depended.”
The pursuit โฃof mathematically definingโข beauty didn’t stop at the buttocks. Cuenca-Guerra, alongside colleague Josรฉ Luis Daza-Flores (who studied under him, becoming, as one observer put it, “the son of buttock augmentation”), extendedโ their focus to the lower leg. Their paper, “Calf Implants,” mirrored the approach taken with the buttocks, identifying “the anatomical characteristics that make calves lookโ attractive” and the “defects” requiring correction. This involved another extensive visual survey – 2,600 images of female legs, scrutinized by โplastic surgeons.
The โขresearchโฃ took an unexpectedโ turn when the authorsโ attempted to link these perceivedโฃ ideals โto the “divine proportion,” also known โขas the golden ratio (approximately 1.6 to 1). This mathematical concept, where the ratio of the โคwholeโข to the larger part is the same as theโฃ larger part to the smaller part, has been historicallyโ applied to art and architecture, including the proportions of the “ideal” โface inโฃ ancient Greek aesthetics.โค The โขauthors โฃsought toโฃ demonstrate thatโ attractiveโฃ legsโ conformed to this ratio.
the paper included statements like, “Seventeen women had thin legs, in the โshape of a tube, and a mere 1:1.618 โคratio in the A-P and L-L projections,” a description that, according to oneโ interpretation, precisely describesโ cankles. While the โspecifics remain complex, the attempt to quantify beauty through mathematical formulas highlights the lengths to which surgeons have โคgone to standardize andโ surgically achieve a visually “ideal” female figure – a figure defined notโค by nature, but by the subjective preferencesโ of a small group of surgeons.
