A recent Instagram post by my friend, fellow writer and creative Logan Miehl, had me close to tears. It was a series of photos of her that were so beautiful, intimate, and real. She paired them with a moving caption about how she never liked photos of herself until these ones. I urge you to read her caption and view the photos here. It’s an empowering post about someone I admire who finally feels at home in her own body.
Besides eliciting an emotional response in me, Logan’s post initiated a journey in which I thought of my own experience with being a subject of photos (or other forms of visual art).
As someone who first took film photography courses in high school and specialized in photography during art school, I’ve had the experience of being both behind and in front of the camera. My image has shown up in photos, pencil drawings, ink drawings, in charcoal, and in paint. I’ve been artist and muse. And while I appreciate participating in another artist’s creative experience, I much prefer being behind the camera.
When I was younger, I was considered to be incredibly photogenic. My friends and family used to joke that it was impossible to take a “bad” photo of me. Yet, I could relate to Logan’s thoughts about seeing a photo of oneself and not quite recognizing the person portrayed. I could see that photos of me from when I was a teenager and early adult were indeed flattering, but why didn’t they look like me? They never seemed to convey the richness of my inner world. How I thought I looked and what I saw when I looked at a snapshot of myself frozen in time were vastly different.
Of course, the photographer was always responsible for capturing a certain expression, however brief. Oftentimes, this expression was one that emerged not because of how I was truly feeling, but because I knew it was the face they expected me to show. I think most of us can relate to the experience of posing for photos. It’s something that we are trained to do from an early age. We are told to smile the moment a camera is pulled out.
Then, if you end up as an artist’s subject, you are told to think of certain things, pose in certain ways, until the artist can reveal how they see you. Wistful, fierce, dreamy. It takes a rare artist to be able to show you/the world as you are rather than as they want you to be.
My heart is glad for Logan, that she finally connected with a photographer, Ainsley, who was able to see Logan the way she sees herself. It made me consider the potential for many of us to begin healing our relationship to self through portraiture. But how do you go about trusting the photographer who will capture your image? It takes a lot of courage, I think.
In recent years, I haven’t wanted my photo taken.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Ink-Stained Compass to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.