We say it all the time in this work: I see you.
What we don’t say: being seen can be scary. Terrifying, even. But when we choose the right lens, it can be powerful, empowering. Joyful.
My first shoot with Bryan was shortly after the 2016 election. I’d been struggling to accept the vicious reality, it wasn’t a show, a gag, a gotcha. Struggling to figure out who I was, in everything. Lost too much weight, unintentionally and too quickly, the result of sickness, not of health. Nearly a third of the highest-ever number on the scale. Couldn’t square the me in the mirror with the me in my head. Felt myself disappearing inside skin that suddenly didn’t fit any better than my clothing did.
I’d been toying with the idea of a photo shoot, something I’d done once or twice before. Specifically, I wanted to be nude. Not erotic images, not this time. Just me, in my skin. Just proof, to myself, that I exist.
That’s when I received the message: “Your smile behind my camera?”
It was the username that made me look twice. Someone who identified an affinity for four-legged critters, he must be good people, right? I skimmed his main portfolio, mostly quirky, personality-filled images of doggos, birdies, reptiles. Saw the split seconds in which he’d captured the quirks, saw his eye for finding imperfect reality rather than the contrived. Looked at the small sampling of images in the non-traditional and natural nude sections of his other portfolios. Saw the easy smiles – smiles! – on the faces of his subjects, women with tattoos, rolls, folds, stretch marks, scars, stories.
They looked so… real. So present. I wanted that. Needed it.
We met for coffee. This is a thing I’ve done before, but never alone, and I wanted to hear my own response to him, feel the moment of gut reaction without worrying about anyone else’s judgment. I’m a hugger, he's a hugger, and so we hugged.
If you pay attention during hugs, you can learn everything you need to know.
The rest of the hour or so was pro forma; we chatted mostly about animals, about being owned by dogs, about his work, about mine. I texted my husband, who’d agreed to meet us if I gave the green light; if his intuition caught something mine missed, I needed to know. Deciding to get naked in front of a stranger’s camera isn’t a thing to do carelessly. My spouse’s antennae, tuned differently but with an exquisite sensitivity for danger, picked up the same reassurances mine did.
Our shoot was, ironically, the Saturday after the 2016 ballots had been cast, improbably, impossibly. A sunny day in suburbia, crisp cheerful post-apocalyptic quiet in the air.
As I pulled into the studio’s near-empty lot, a single car drove past. The driver waved. Confused, I continued, grabbed my bag from the back seat.
Froze.
The car had circled back, pulled in close, trapping me in a small U-shape of the building’s architecture.
“Can I get your number?” the man behind the wheel asked. “I’d like to get to know you.”
You know that flood, the adrenaline, the terror, the rage. And this was, after all, the America that had just elected a proud predator to the highest office in the land. Grab ‘em, do anything you want, they let you. I felt it all, in that moment.
And, bizarre but perhaps not, the thought that I was in leggings and a sweater, a cozy scarf, no makeup. Self-blame, long imprinted. My fault, for existing. Did I still exist?
“Don’t come any closer. I don’t want to get to know you. I want you to leave.”
I’m not sure where the bravado, the childlike words, came from; this was the dark-alley moment in bright sunshine. Why didn’t I placate, give a false number, make him leave thinking he'd won? It’s what I always thought I’d do.
His next words, as he cut the engine. “I’m sorry to have offended you, miss. I can see why you’d think I was beneath you.” Chilling, that false humility, a passive aggression designed to call me out, make me feel guilty, force me to be nice, to reassure him. Reassure HIM. I felt the tactic, the violence behind it.
“I don’t want you to come any closer. You need to go away.” I repeated it; I’m not sure how I spoke at all.
I’m not sure what made him start the car again, drive away, let me be.
It was the most threatened I’d ever felt by a complete stranger, the first “dark alley” moment after years of walking city streets late at night, alert but at ease. Possibly there were other moments, probably there were, where the actual danger was greater. But this one, this bright day after the world had collapsed, this time I felt it.
Barely moving, I texted Bryan to let him know I’d arrived so he could buzz me in. Told him about the man, the car. Accepted one of those hugs, shook for long minutes. He assured me we didn’t have to continue the shoot, nothing mattered more than my comfort. But in the close quarters of the studio, the bright white backdrop, surrounded by photos of mastiffs and conures, I was safe.
The hours that followed produced some powerful images. The moments in which I let the robe slide down my back, turned to face the lens, took a deep breath, let it out slowly. The ways I chose to shape myself, nodding at modesty but not coy, goofing my way through the strategic placement of a forearm to cover this, a calf to hide that.
Alt rock streaming low-volume through the speakers. An oversized tophat resting absurdly on my shoulders, silliness from behind studded "don't you know who I am" sunglasses, reenacting an accidentally walk through a spider web.
Lightning flashes through the ways my face changes when I speak. Haunting, raw, the things he found in my eyes, as I tried to arrange myself in my skin as the afternoon passed. And my favorite moment, entitled “Naked Air Guitar.” Possibly, it’s the most real solo image ever captured of me. Ridiculous, delight.
And at the end, exhausted, flat on my back, the eye of his camera from above, serene. They weren’t my favorite photos, gravity and this skin being they are, but I remembered the utter trust of the moment.
So when we did this shoot, intended only for a single portrait, when he spotted the geometry in the flat array of mushrooms, it felt like a recall. He saved it for the end, neither of us speaking about why, just knowing.
We were brisk and efficient this time, a Christmas Eve day session, both of us with commitments, obligations. The air raw on the lake, bone-chilled despite the scarf, the fingerless gloves, the layers.
I’d forgotten, the way he sees through those things.
Flipping through the proofs, a shiver again, but warm this time. (I don’t think of myself as photogenic; I can’t pose casually, gaze thoughtfully into the distance, arrange myself properly in front of a camera. That I remembered not to slouch once or twice is a fairly strong accomplishment.) Imperfect moments when I'm laughing, pulling faces, playful. And, like the addition of color and design in the evolution of these aesthetics, the photos became necessary, an unexpected counterpoint, a different reason to show myself. There are more; I'll share those at different points, too.
Never, ever, underestimate the beauty, the healing to be found in letting the right person see you.
You are the right people, here. Through the words, I’m offering up my pain, my fear, my struggle, the things you've told me are helpful to you as you find your own way through this. So you deserve, too, to see my capacity for joy, and the moments of peace I'm still just learning are possible.
We both deserve that.
Much love,
Jess
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