From selfies to synthetic faces: selective aesthetic compression in East Asian beauty representation

Abstract East Asian beauty aesthetics are routinely treated as a single, homogeneous category, both in popular discourse and in the AI representation literature. This integrative review challenges that assumption. Drawing on postcolonial theory, prior colorimetric evidence from East Asian selfie cultures, practitioner accounts of K-beauty as a commercial mediation chain, and an exploratory colorimetric audit of commercially produced virtual human figures, it examines what happens to aesthetic diversity when beauty is no longer individually expressed but institutionally designed. The review documents nationally differentiated hue patterns in East Asian selfie aesthetics that resist reduction to a single whitening desire, then examines how commercial mediation appears to erode that differentiation in commercially designed synthetic faces. The central contribution is the concept of selective aesthetic compression: the targeted erosion of nationally specific hue cues while commercially legible warm-tone properties are preserved. This process is situated within a postcolonial framework drawing on Iwabuchi’s (2002) mukokuseki and Tolentino’s (2019) Instagram Face, and extended to argue that generative AI systems trained on commercially compressed imagery may recursively normalize a narrowed aesthetic range. The implications extend beyond beauty representation to the broader question of whether algorithmic systems can preserve the aesthetic plurality they inherit from the cultures they are trained on. Data availability The data analyzed in this study include previously collected social media image data, practitioner interview materials, and publicly available virtual human images used for exploratory visual analysis. 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S.H. provided foundational input on the postcolonial perspective and its integration into the manuscript’s conceptual argument. B.S. guided the image data analysis strategy and contributed to the methodological interpretation of the visual evidence. All authors reviewed and approved the final manuscript. Corresponding author Ethics declarations Conflict of interest The authors declare no competing interests. Use of generative AI During the preparation of this manuscript, the author(s) used ChatGPT to assist with language editing and reference consistency checks. All substantive arguments, analyses, interpretations, and conclusions were developed and verified by the author(s), who take full responsibility for the content of the manuscript. Additional information Publisher's Note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Rights and permissions Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law. About this article Cite this article You, J., Park, S., Suh, B. et al. From selfies to synthetic faces: selective aesthetic compression in East Asian beauty representation. AI & Soc (2026). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-026-03318-w Received: Accepted: Published: Version of record: DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-026-03318-w