What I have learned from photographing over 500 women.

Photos of me by Nadia Meli

(Before I start I want to take a moment to acknowledge intersectionality. The issues I am going to talk about impact more humans than just women. I am sharing my own experience as someone who identifies as a woman and who largely works with people who identify as women.)

Another piece of my brain on the blog. It’s the week of International Women’s Day and I wanted to try and put into words my insights from a career spanning over 5yrs and over 500 clients photographing mostly women.

Women who are boldly making their own mark in the world through their businesses and careers. Women who put out huge amounts of value and who are making positive change in their various lines of work, passions and entrepreneurship. Women who all seem to have the same negative beliefs around how they should show up. Or worse not feeling like they are good enough to show up.

Week in and week out I hear the same negative self talk. I hate my smile, I hate my double chin, I am too fat, I need to lose weight, this is my best side, I look old, the list is endless. And heartbreaking.

How can such incredible humans be reduced to the value of their appearance? Terrified of taking up space because they don’t feel like they meet a ridiculous set of beauty standards.

But that is how the patriarchy works. Women are powerful and for centuries a system has been in place to control us. To keep us small and reduced to objects. The worst part is that it lives inside of us. Most of us have been subjected to a lifetime of conditioning that has us believe that we are only of value if we look and behave in a certain way.

I have spent the last few years acknowledging this in myself. Trying to untangle the hate I have for myself, that was embedded into my sense of self from the first moment I was sexualised, encouraged to be thinner, subjected to abuse from other girls as well as boys, subjected to diet culture, witnessed other women berate themselves, told to cover up, called a slut, shamed for my body hair, told to be quiet and on and on it goes.

An abusive cycle of conditioning designed to keep us in check.

I am not alone in this. I see it in my clients, my friends and my family.

Internalised misogyny and male gaze.

It’s exhausting and takes up so much space in our heads and that’s the point… Imagine what we could achieve with all that extra headspace? Imagine if we could just show up as our full unapologetic selves? Imagine how much more less judgemental, empowered and loving we would be if we didn’t hate ourselves based on the way we look?

Imagine if we felt like we could take up space? Speak up? Experience our full range of emotions?

Imagine the impact on future generations if we engage with the work of self love?

So how does this all relate to photographing women?

Over and over I witness so many women change the moment I pick up the camera. Adjusting themselves to make themselves smaller, I watch as the discomfort sets in, an unwillingness to show any form of full expression. And it makes me so sad because moments ago I would have had someone in front of me talking passionately about what they do, laughing, talking about what enrages them or what makes them feel alive.

It’s the moment they are actually facing themselves and being witnessed they have a desire to shrink into nothing more than what they have been told makes them flattering.

Who decided what that is? Reflect on that for a moment.

And I say this as someone who feels all of those things. I have had several of my own photo shoots over the last few years after a lifetime of hiding from the camera. Each time has been a reckoning with myself. Every god damn time I see photos of myself I think, am I attractive? And then go into a space of pulling myself apart because I am worried about whether men will find me attractive or not.

There I have said it. I can’t write this without being totally honest about my own experience and when I say men I am not referring to individuals. I am talking about the male gaze.

The male gaze is a sexualised way of portraying women. It’s how we have been portrayed throughout cinema, literature and the visual arts throughout history. It’s how women are objectified, reduced down to their appearance for the pleasure of the heterosexual man. It manifests through camera angles, close ups of a woman’s body, how up until recently a female role was always to support a male lead and if it was a female lead there needed to be some sort of love story (more often than not a toxic one). It’s still an issue but slowly we are seeing women portrayed in a more diverse and human way.

That being said, it lives on inside of us.

Ever been sat on your own, maybe in a cafe and found yourself adjusting your appearance? Wondering about what you look like? If you seem attractive? That’s male gaze. It haunts us because of what we have been consuming throughout our entire lives.

I walk past mirrors in my home and regularly check my side profile to see how thin I look. Like who cares? I am on my own and also why is this relevant to my existence? These are not my thoughts I tell myself now. This constant concern over our appearance is holding us back and that is why having your portrait taken and starting the process of self love and acceptance is important.

It’s step towards setting yourself free.

Fighting this does start with ourselves, we must fight against our own internalised misogyny and self hate before we can begin to tackle it outside of ourselves. It starts with… These thoughts are not mine. One of the most powerful things I tell myself when that voice starts to pull me apart.

As photographers though I feel like we have a huge responsibility in this fight. And it is a fight. I think back to the early days in my career when I hadn’t started the work and how I chose to pose people or what I decided was flattering for them. Not thinking about how they would feel or would like to show up.

I just wanted to make pretty pictures that would get me more work. I didn’t recognise that I was causing harm.

That has changed now. I now view what I do as a tool for empowerment, to show the people I work with how fucking amazing they are without having to change a thing about themselves. I want to create space for my clients to find confidence in themselves. I want it to be a collaboration of self discovery. To help them see what I see. A full human being that deserves to take up space, be seen and be heard.

When I started my career I had a male photographer tell me that I should only show what I wanted to sell in my portfolio, to only show the attractive people. I still see this in wedding photography referral groups where someone will post about an enquiry they can’t do and then make a statement about how attractive they are. Why does that even matter? I also remember coming across a photographer who refused to book brides who were over a size 12.

We haven’t moved away from this. It’s just playing out in different ways. Photographers don’t show enough diversity in their portfolios. Chasing likes on a social media platform rather than recognising the importance for representation. I see it in the wave of wedding styled shoots happening atm, white thin couples after white thin couples. Often young, cisgendered and heterosexual.

Or photographers who won’t share all of their clients often because their appearance doesn’t fit certain beauty standards or trends. I get it. You want to attract your ideal client but how much of your ideal client has been influenced by your unconscious bias?

One of the biggest comments I get from my clients is that when they visit my portfolio they can see themselves in my work. That they feel safe that I am going to help them be themselves regardless of what they look like.

I share every single one of my shoots to my social media as long as I have permission. Because my work is client focused, because I genuinely believe in them showing up and because I believe that everyone deserves to take up space.

I can’t stress how important this is if you want to contribute to better representation and empowering the people you work with. Can you imagine how you might make someone feel if they see everyone else you work with shared proudly but not them? How you make people feel is one the most important parts of marketing and excluding people is a sure fire way to make someone feel like shit and enhance those nasty voices in their heads. If you make people feel included, worthy and empowered then not only are you contributing to better representation for everyone you are also going to build a better and more successful business.

One of the most rewarding parts of my job is when I see a woman unfold in front of me. When they start to fill the space I create for them. When I can help them see what I see. More times than once I have had my clients cry on a shoot when I show them the back of the camera because for the first time they see themselves.

I can’t tell you how powerful it is for a woman to see herself that way. As a whole human being who has permission to be fully herself. That’s how I fight this fight. One woman at a time.