[Music]
[Applause]
there I am leaning up against the wall
I’m naked I’m I’m trying to be sexy in
front of me my friend points for camera
at me I’m feeling really awkward frozen
like a deer in headlights the reason why
I was doing this for my husband I wanted
to do a sexy photo book but I was
starting to regret my idea in the closet
I get a boa and I throw it around my
neck to hide the feathers egg on my
inner diva and soon I’m playing feeling
sultry and sassy silly and sweet seeing
the photo surprise me in them I discover
facets of myself I forgotten about or
dismissed and as it turned out the photo
book was really for me later I
photographed my friend we laugh a lot we
agree that this is such a liberating
experience something every woman should
do for herself and this was the
beginning of my photographic journey
with a thousand or less naked women and
a few brave men I’m here today as a
writer and a photographer and I want to
talk about the therapeutic potential of
photography and the power of our gaze
how the way we see can limit or liberate
ourselves and each other friends came
and soon strangers in 2004 I opened my
I fill that with vintage props and
furnitures and fabrics this was to be a
playground for women to dress up and
undress and Riaan chant our lives today
I’m actually speaking to the female
experience but I want to say to all of
you here that the journey of liberation
is is ready for all of us so who were
these women they were shy and soft and
racy and rebellious women they were CEOs
and social workers and students they
were mothers and married and single they
were women with roles cellulite scars
women navigating cancer abuse heartbreak
women unsure how to be sensual or
women of all shapes and sizes have come
to be photographed on their own dime and
desire the photos were for private not
for social media not for TEDx for that
matter but here we are woman by woman I
became really good at capturing and
attractive appearance over time though
our focus on sexiness started to feel
like a shallow and limiting you and I
had to dig into my own female identity I
grew up in a traditional patriarchal
family in the 70s during the women’s
liberation movement and as a kid I
watched the predominant power structure
between men and women and I must have
decided that I was going to
free accept my idea of liberation was
tied to equality I wanted to prove
myself equal to the boys to the men not
through my looks through my intellect my
skills my sexual freedom I was really
proud of my independence it took me
years to understand that I’d actually
pursued my Worth and my value and my
sense of freedom of on mens terms rather
than my own so at the studio I began to
question how could we women express
ourselves on our own terms
and see ourselves let me give you a few
examples there’s this young woman who
comes her mother calls her fat her
husband of one year calls her ugly he
wants a divorce she lives her shirt to
show me and there is her belly
it’s soft and tender not fat
instinctually I say let’s start here at
first she looks like a beaten dog
through the camera but as we play an
experiment with different ideas and
poses and places she moves through the
hurt and the anger and the laughter and
at the end the belly has been forgotten
and I capture this of her walking into
her new life at least how that’s how it
seemed to me the photo came to symbolize
self-love to her to me perhaps a return
to innocence so most of the women came
to get a new sense of themselves and a
new relationship to their bodies and
sexuality I found that by directing less
and allowing for more space even
for awkward moments where we had no idea
what to do next
the women would start to come to their
own revelations and expressions I also
found that by addressing the wound
straight on like the woman with the
belly and her low self-esteem that the
energy and the feeling could shift and
therefore also her the story she tells
herself about it another example a woman
comes she’s around 50 she’s going
through a life transition she says my my
life has become a prison I feel like
I’ve lost my voice my joy I become
invisible even to myself she wants to
create a storybook of where she’s been
and where she’s going I look for visual
metaphors to help illustrate her inner
feelings and emotions like this or this
the photos become evidence of her
transformation by creating lots of
different photographs you get to see
many sides of herself and by creating
creating more poetic portraits she gets
to begin to see and sense herself beyond
just appearance nudity have become a
really interesting metaphor for our
honesty it’s not that nudity is required
it’s an invitation
but with less stuff to hide inside the
women can automatically become more
present and available and with working
with the body movement and the language
of the body more directly it’s easier
for me to guide the women back in touch
with their inner sensation of intimacy
aliveness strength beauty joy love fury
and when she can feel herself I can feel
her and then I can capture more I’m
embodied expressions
and this is where beauty lies and blooms
it’s not necessarily pretty but it’s
honest it’s alive its mysterious
sometimes ferocious this is how I’d like
to be seen and I think this is how we
all would like to be seen in our human
light in our human shadow oops this was
the moment I dreaded the most
oh the slides are gonna go crazy so what
aside from a lot of photographs it adds
up to a grim reality and a beautiful
Vista let’s look at the grim reality
first the majority of these relatively
privileged women have all feel felt
shame and struggle with their body and
sexuality where have we lost sight and
sense of ourselves it’s a long story as
you may know but for instance for the
past 150 years alone with the invention
of photography women have mostly been
photographed by men for men the female
body and sexuality is rarely seen as her
own if it’s not used to sell something
or gain something its shamed and
commented on on from all fronts just
take a look at social media once the
female body was revered for its
fertility and mystery today it’s become
a battlefield where men and women
fashion and media religion and commerce
fight for power and money in my work
I’ve seen this that the battlefield has
moved inside women’s psyches and bodies
we’ve become so used to subjugating
ourselves to the predominant culture
view on women that including the male
gaze and including the the female
competitive glances that we barely
notice now the beautiful view this work
has taught me to see with my heart and
capture moments of acceptance the women
has gift gifted me with with views of
their inner lives and their souls it’s
been an honor to see them and help them
see themselves and help them reclaim
their bodies from being a seducer I have
become a witness the women might have
come for beauty but what they really
needed was to be witnessed not by harsh
and hungry eyes but by gentle eyes
genuinely interested in the person
inside they wanted if only for a moment
to exist without judgement by us coming
together with openness and curiosity we
have been able to empower each other and
exchange the female competition with
solidarity when we come together like
this it’s not momentarily losing your
inhibition that leads to yourself love
or acceptance or a sense of wholeness
it’s when you find the courage and the
freedom to reveal yourself to another
and this is how intimate photography
encounters can offer healing
transformation
and celebration dear friends with and
without the camera I do believe there’s
an art to seeing and being seen because
our gaze is never without power it’s
never neutral it’s informed by our
experiences and conditioning our biases
and our beliefs our preferences and
agendas and also how we feel and about
and see ourselves in many ways we’re
blind we don’t see each other fully and
freely but what happens when we
surrender this need what happens when we
stop judging we become present available
for the discovery look around you now
you can look around you I know you can’t
[Applause] [Music]
[Applause]
there I am leaning up against the wall
I’m naked I’m I’m trying to be sexy in
front of me my friend points for camera
at me I’m feeling really awkward frozen
like a deer in headlights the reason why
I was doing this for my husband I wanted
to do a sexy photo book but I was
starting to regret my idea in the closet
I get a boa and I throw it around my
neck to hide the feathers egg on my
inner diva and soon I’m playing feeling
sultry and sassy silly and sweet seeing
the photo surprise me in them I discover
facets of myself I forgotten about or
dismissed and as it turned out the photo
book was really for me later I
photographed my friend we laugh a lot we
agree that this is such a liberating
experience something every woman should
do for herself and this was the
beginning of my photographic journey
with a thousand or less naked women and
a few brave men I’m here today as a
writer and a photographer and I want to
talk about the therapeutic potential of
photography and the power of our gaze
how the way we see can limit or liberate
ourselves and each other friends came
and soon strangers in 2004 I opened my
I fill that with vintage props and
furnitures and fabrics this was to be a
playground for women to dress up and
undress and Riaan chant our lives today
I’m actually speaking to the female
experience but I want to say to all of
you here that the journey of liberation
is is ready for all of us so who were
these women they were shy and soft and
racy and rebellious women they were CEOs
and social workers and students they
were mothers and married and single they
were women with roles cellulite scars
women navigating cancer abuse heartbreak
women unsure how to be sensual or
women of all shapes and sizes have come
to be photographed on their own dime and
desire the photos were for private not
for social media not for TEDx for that
matter but here we are woman by woman I
became really good at capturing and
attractive appearance over time though
our focus on sexiness started to feel
like a shallow and limiting you and I
had to dig into my own female identity I
grew up in a traditional patriarchal
family in the 70s during the women’s
liberation movement and as a kid I
watched the predominant power structure
between men and women and I must have
decided that I was going to
free accept my idea of liberation was
tied to equality I wanted to prove
myself equal to the boys to the men not
through my looks through my intellect my
skills my sexual freedom I was really
proud of my independence it took me
years to understand that I’d actually
pursued my Worth and my value and my
sense of freedom of on mens terms rather
than my own so at the studio I began to
question how could we women express
ourselves on our own terms
and see ourselves let me give you a few
examples there’s this young woman who
comes her mother calls her fat her
husband of one year calls her ugly he
wants a divorce she lives her shirt to
show me and there is her belly
it’s soft and tender not fat
instinctually I say let’s start here at
first she looks like a beaten dog
through the camera but as we play an
experiment with different ideas and
poses and places she moves through the
hurt and the anger and the laughter and
at the end the belly has been forgotten
and I capture this of her walking into
her new life at least how that’s how it
seemed to me the photo came to symbolize
self-love to her to me perhaps a return
to innocence so most of the women came
to get a new sense of themselves and a
new relationship to their bodies and
sexuality I found that by directing less
and allowing for more space even
for awkward moments where we had no idea
what to do next
the women would start to come to their
own revelations and expressions I also
found that by addressing the wound
straight on like the woman with the
belly and her low self-esteem that the
energy and the feeling could shift and
therefore also her the story she tells
herself about it another example a woman
comes she’s around 50 she’s going
through a life transition she says my my
life has become a prison I feel like
I’ve lost my voice my joy I become
invisible even to myself she wants to
create a storybook of where she’s been
and where she’s going I look for visual
metaphors to help illustrate her inner
feelings and emotions like this or this
the photos become evidence of her
transformation by creating lots of
different photographs you get to see
many sides of herself and by creating
creating more poetic portraits she gets
to begin to see and sense herself beyond
just appearance nudity have become a
really interesting metaphor for our
honesty it’s not that nudity is required
it’s an invitation
but with less stuff to hide inside the
women can automatically become more
present and available and with working
with the body movement and the language
of the body more directly it’s easier
for me to guide the women back in touch
with their inner sensation of intimacy
aliveness strength beauty joy love fury
and when she can feel herself I can feel
her and then I can capture more I’m
embodied expressions
and this is where beauty lies and blooms
it’s not necessarily pretty but it’s
honest it’s alive its mysterious
sometimes ferocious this is how I’d like
to be seen and I think this is how we
all would like to be seen in our human
light in our human shadow oops this was
the moment I dreaded the most
oh the slides are gonna go crazy so what
aside from a lot of photographs it adds
up to a grim reality and a beautiful
Vista let’s look at the grim reality
first the majority of these relatively
privileged women have all feel felt
shame and struggle with their body and
sexuality where have we lost sight and
sense of ourselves it’s a long story as
you may know but for instance for the
past 150 years alone with the invention
of photography women have mostly been
photographed by men for men the female
body and sexuality is rarely seen as her
own if it’s not used to sell something
or gain something its shamed and
commented on on from all fronts just
take a look at social media once the
female body was revered for its
fertility and mystery today it’s become
a battlefield where men and women
fashion and media religion and commerce
fight for power and money in my work
I’ve seen this that the battlefield has
moved inside women’s psyches and bodies
we’ve become so used to subjugating
ourselves to the predominant culture
view on women that including the male
gaze and including the the female
competitive glances that we barely
notice now the beautiful view this work
has taught me to see with my heart and
capture moments of acceptance the women
has gift gifted me with with views of
their inner lives and their souls it’s
been an honor to see them and help them
see themselves and help them reclaim
their bodies from being a seducer I have
become a witness the women might have
come for beauty but what they really
needed was to be witnessed not by harsh
and hungry eyes but by gentle eyes
genuinely interested in the person
inside they wanted if only for a moment
to exist without judgement by us coming
together with openness and curiosity we
have been able to empower each other and
exchange the female competition with
solidarity when we come together like
this it’s not momentarily losing your
inhibition that leads to yourself love
or acceptance or a sense of wholeness
it’s when you find the courage and the
freedom to reveal yourself to another
and this is how intimate photography
encounters can offer healing
transformation
and celebration dear friends with and
without the camera I do believe there’s
an art to seeing and being seen because
our gaze is never without power it’s
never neutral it’s informed by our
experiences and conditioning our biases
and our beliefs our preferences and
agendas and also how we feel and about
and see ourselves in many ways we’re
blind we don’t see each other fully and
freely but what happens when we
surrender this need what happens when we
stop judging we become present available
for the discovery look around you now
you can look around you I know you can’t
[Applause] [Music]
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