“I love my body is my mantra on loop”
“My relationship with my body has come a long way. I took a long time to bloom into something that felt to me like womanhood. Narrow hips, smaller breasts - all things that took a while to kick in and when they came felt like an anti-climax - to my then self. Belly fat, I loathed and guess where exactly I’m prone to weight gain. That was my relationship to my body for a long time.
Not anymore. The characteristics of my physique are still as described above but I feel differently about it now. I’m 34, and I am so grateful to have a body that carries me, a body that responds to fitness, a body that has its own unique curvature and feels sexy when I’m feeling sexy - for me. Besides being perceived as sexy my body is mine, it echoes the body shape of my mother, which I love to see, it holds me, it talks to me about what’s going on inside, I am in motion because it gracefully allows me to be - even when I don’t feed it optimally. My body is amazing, and I feel grateful to it - working towards viewing it consistently in a non-performative, powerful matter-of-fact way. I love my body is the mantra on loop.
I like the idea of capturing this moment of being young and strong. Bodies are always changing, if I have the privilege to grow old there will be much to accept in terms of new ways to view beauty when the standard hallmarks of beauty fade. Right now, I feel a hard-earned sense of ease with my body, one round of acceptance has already been done and this mind state is worth capturing.
I was hoping to get a fresh point of view of my body, be surprised by the different angles of it revealed through someone else’s lens. I also wanted my sensuality to be seen, I go that to a degree though some images surprised me. It looks a different way than how I feel - I think when I view myself I focus on different shapes and lines, so it was refreshing to see another point of view of my body. I guess it’s always like that when viewed from a different creator's point of view. What was captured was what was there. The shoot itself felt comfortable, empowering and fun. Annelies is a good steward and I felt beautiful”