Glossy Photos of Paraguay's Miss Gorditas

This article originally appeared on VICE France

The Miss Gordita beauty contest – which translates to "Miss Chubby" – was founded by Mike Beras in 2012. It's held in April every year, in Paraguay's capital Asunción. Out of the hundreds of women who register on Facebook, 14 are chosen for the contest and only one is crowned Miss Gordita. Last year's winner was Romina Verna.

Bernas also started a model agency called Plus Size, in 2012. With the beauty contest and the agency, Mike and the models are trying to change how Paraguayans view overweight women. While almost half of the of the country's population is overweight, heavier women face discrimination every day.

Mike introduced me to some of the models at the agency, and I made a series about them in 2015. Laura Ochipinti, one of the women I talked to, weighed more than 220 lbs but had always dreamt of working in a showroom. When she went for an interview, the manager told her she was "too fat" and would "scare away the customers". Beras told me that when the models of his agency were invited to a TV show, the host laughed while holding a cake under a model's nose. A production assistant at another show asked the girls to be careful not to break the chairs they were sitting on.

These are just some of the individual experiences the women I spoke to remembered clearly – but they also told me about the more underlying discrimination they face in their jobs, about the looks and comments they're getting on the streets, about what it feels like when you notice that even your boyfriend is embarrassed to be with you in public. It's hard, but by working as models, these women are trying to change the representation of overweight women in Paraguayan media and – hopefully – that will also cause a change in public opinion.

After reading about the Miss Gordita contest in an Argentinian newspaper and meeting these women in 2015, I knew immediately what tone my series about them should have. I wanted to capture them at home or at work, but more through a fashion lens than a documentary one – I wanted to capture their glamour and the harsh reality of their daily lives at the same time.

Scroll down for more of Jean-Jérôme Detouches' photos of the Miss Gordita contestants