In the Bibles Book of Samuel, David was a shepherd and harpist in his adolescence when he managed to kill the Philistine Goliath with a sling and a stone. And when the Philistine looked about, and saw David, he disdained him: for he was but a youth, and ruddy, and of a fair countenance, reads 1 Samuel 17:42 in the King James translation. Michelangelo, between 1501 and 1504, interpreted these descriptions through Renaissance ideals, giving the biblical hero a lean and muscular build and creating the first-ever colossal marble statue of the modern era.In 2024, Michelangelos David became the literal face or inspiration behind several brands. There is, of course, the namesake protein bar (Humans arent perfect, but David is); Jawliners line of jawline-fitness chewing gums (featuring a version of David wearing hipster glasses, no less); and the HercuLean supplement line Vintage Muscle, clearly inspired by Davids iconic visage and muscular and lean build. He has become a signifier of Chad culture, which emphasizes and worships a so-called alpha (or simply sexually successful) male. Food and supplements serve as a gateway into this trend.[Images: David, Jawliner, HercuLean]A Chad food is something that has a lot of protein, Andrea Hernandez, who writes the Snaxshot newsletter, explained on the December 9 episode of the podcast Taste. Even Gen A has been brought into the conversation: they have the Gigachad meme, and this whole thing about mewing and perfecting your body. According to Hernandez, the Gigachad memewhich features a black-and-white photograph of a very muscular bodybuilder with a jaw thats borderline polygonal and a neck that is trapezoidalis the modern-day David.These products exist alongside the likes of Natty Ice Cream, a protein-rich ice cream that displays a swole Zeus drawn in the style of Marvel comics on its packaging; To My Ships, a personal-care line inspired by The Iliad where black-and-white digital artworks of sculptural torsos and backs by Lucas Babinet are an integral part of the branding; Coffee Mates Protein Creamer featuring six-pack airbrushed on the bottle (its satire but it comes from the official account); Flamingo Estates Bathhouse edit and their For Your Pleasure campaign; adaptogenic drink brand Human Desires Come and Get It campaign; fitness-center Equinoxs I Want It All campaign; and, of course, actor Jeremy Allen White flaunting a chiseled physique in Calvin Klein ads.[Images: To My Ships (Lucas Babinet AI artwork left, background), Calvin Klein, Natty Ice Cream]This past August, cannabis brand Pure Beauty shot a campaign featuring athletes and bodybuilders. More recently, the physique of alleged United Healthcare assassin Luigi Mangione has been at the forefront of the conversation surrounding the aftermath of the murder of Brian Thompson. In 2024, it seems, we entered the year of the [Giga]Chador at least the year of the Beefcake Glyptothequein branding across categories.Textbook Trend CyclingMen spent the last year obsessing over the Roman Empire, and Gladiator II is currently playing in theaters. The tradwife trend needed a male counterpart, and they got it in what Dielines Chloe Gordon calls Trad Masculinity. But the rise of the Chad culture has deeper roots than its pop-culture tie-ins suggest. I think critics of this trend really attach its origins to 4chan INCEL communities in the 2010s, which were obviously very obsessed with the classic ideal of beauty, says Emma Glenn Baker, writer, host of the podcast STARGIRL, and a personal trainer in NYC. While her show started off as an examination of female pop-cultural figures both niche and mainstream that stand out in their industries, over the past year, Baker has explored societys relationship with the body in her Body Series podcast spinoff. View this post on Instagram A post shared by KRISTA SUDMALIS (@sleekntears)And indeed, the aforementioned Gigachad meme did originate on 4Chan in 2017. For the uninitiated, it features a photographic rendering of a bodybuilder from the SLEEKNTEARS project by Russian-born photographer Krista Sudmalis. And while his likeness is based on bodybuilder Ernest Khalimov, the final product is the result of a composite and digital manipulation. The giga prefix just refers to the subjects size, and the fact that his appearance makes him, by 4Chan logic, superior to the regular Chad.As the Gigachad meme percolated from 4Chan, it became part of popular culture. And like all parts of culture, it has been subject to the pendulum swing of trends. Designer and writer Elizabeth Goodspeed remembers seeing buff, classicized imagery everywhere when she was in college a little over a decade ago. I remember everybody at art school at the time was really obsessed with putting these digital marble statues into things, she says. Marble generally was big and there were a lot of Adonis figures coming through: I do think there is a bit of a precedent to that, and it makes sense with the typical trend cycle where thats, you know, now about 10 years now.Backlash to 2010s ValuesThe modern usage of masculine imagery stems from a backlash against artifice, both in food and self-presentation. In a November 2024 post titled Pendulum Swung Back Hard, Snaxshots Hernandez described so-called Chad foodstallow chips, raw milk, organ smoothies, overpriced bone broth, beef tallow, and colostrum powdersas a canary in the coal mine for broader conservative politics and industry-defining foods and ingredients. It is a stark contrast to the plant-based dairy and meat alternatives that defined the 2010s.Baker sees this type of imagery as a reaction to the larger body-positivity movement. Not necessarily the actual fundamental principles of wanting to love your body and celebrate your body, whether or not you look like a model, but I think the top-down directive from culturepeople butted heads with that, she says. People felt the politics of that as a consumer. I think, just naturally, when youre constantly being told how to think and consume something, youre going to react to that and say, NO.[Image: The New Yorker]Recentering the body can also be interpreted as a backlash to the work-from-home lifestyle of the pandemics height, perfectly exemplified by a November 2020 cover of The New Yorker depicting a remote worker surrounded by a cutesy mixture of clutter and filth. I think theres a way to look at what were seeing with the recentering of body and muscularity and physique as more lighthearted and positive. [Classicized imagery in branding] is not just saying this is the beauty ideal but physical capability is hot. Its a reaction to this very older-millennial vibe, work-from-home and Uber Eats lifestyle, says Baker. Were done with the Uber Eats.The Queer Roots of Classicized ImageryBut its shortsighted to think of classicized imagery as simply reactionary. In fact, figurative hypermasculine imagery has historical roots in queer art. Illustrious precedents include Bob Mizers Physique Pictorial, the photography of George Platt Lynes and Robert Mapplethorpe, the illustrations of Tom of Finland and George Quaintance; and Michelangelo himself. The whole premise of the 2019 book Buying Gay posits that physique magazines were instrumental in building communities and advancing gay rights. Queer artists have long been associated with trends before they become mainstream, says Court Watson, a theatrical designer, figure-drawing instructor, and illustrator who published the book-length monograph Gymnasium in November 2024.An image from Gymnasium, Court Watson, 2024.Watson traces the aesthetic of these modern Chad brands to the 1980s. I think something changed in the mid-80s in gay culture, they note. During the early days of the AIDS crisis, men who looked slim and toned as Clones started to be perceived as sick if they didnt have the worked-out, post-Jane Fonda body. I think a lot of men have a tough time being perceived as anything other than strong.Goodspeed echoes this sentiment. Theres something kind of interesting to me about this idea of how the most elite and privileged thing that you can have is health in a period where we are facing food recalls and lower quality food, says Goodspeed. I think being physically fit is a marker of affluence in a way that it always has been increasingly difficult to do.And while classicized imagery is currently on trend, it also benefits from being timeless, as its periodic resurfacing throughout history demonstrates. Using it in branding can yield trend-resistant visual assets and packaging. Look no further than Skimss newly opened flagship store in New York City: designed by Rafael de Cardenas, it has a neutral-colored palette, statuary-inspired props, and a system of niches and alcoves that does look like a museums antique wing.[Screenshot: To My Ships]To My Ships is another example of a brand using sculpture-inspired imagery in a tasteful and restrained manner. To My Shipss founder Daniel Bense told me his entire team isinspired by classical Greek ideals and the endless artistic reference to and reinterpretation of these, whether by Kara Walker, Hans Josephsohn, Cecily Brown, Franois Halard, Cy Twombly, or Troy Schooneman. Bense is personally drawn to classic ideals of form, proportion, and the golden ratio, seeing them as a manifestation of timelessness. Both classicism and neoclassicism offer a refuge from the frenetic pace and sensory overload of modern life, evoking a sense of permanence and enduring beauty and the power of restraintlike the understated elegance of classical forms, Bense explains. It seems there is a growing desire for authenticity and meaning in a world saturated with fleeting trends and disposable products. Classicism offers a kind of antidote to this modern malaise.