Also, in the
Roaring Twenties, the ideal figure was slim and
boyish (
flat) -
flapper styles were cut straight to
flatter that
figure. Kinda similar to
models nowadays, who rarely ever have breasts half the size of mine
(that's a complaint, not a brag) - unless they're models in
sex toy catalogs. Don't ask me how i know that.
Body shape is one of those things about fashion that fluctuates madly. However, it is seen as more essential to one's self than the clothing one wears, and there are a lot of buried cultural valuations placed on it. (Please also read sensitivity and fat people.) For example, i suspect that people think of me as motherly for the reason mentioned above. And i also think that i would not be so hung up on gender identity and body image if i did not have such an undeniably female body.
Large breasts did feature prominently in a lot of very early artwork and fetishes (in the traditional, not the modern sense). This is usually because the images had some ritual and symbolic significance having to do with fertility, and by extension, bounty, continuation, and wealth. There are similar images with enlarged phalli, hands, noses, stomachs - while it is true that there are places where roundness in general is seen as attractive, the intention of these figures and drawings were not to make images of attractive women and their breasts but to perform a function. You think they drew the buffalo hunt for fun? Well, maybe they did. But they also had a ritual purpose.