SEEN SESSIONS
I offer Seen as a new portrayal. A somatic-focused way of showing up and showing, a body-lead, feels>looks witnessing experience resulting in photographs as reflections, as oracles, and symbols of what is and will never be again.
Read More“I loved the freedom of letting inspiration strike—of choosing the thing that felt right and not that was pre-determined. I loved the deep safety I felt while being completely exposed.
I am stunned and thrilled and think they are some of the most true images I’ve ever seen of myself.”
Read MoreThis is New Portrayal
A body of work co-created with deconstruction worker women being ourselves, together. We’re curating new experiences with being seen, seeing, and offering a new take on the significance of image and the experience of portrayal.
Read More
I’ve had some pretty cool experiences in my life but this one really stands out.
A group of close friends hired me, met me out at the Salt Flats and when we got there the salt flats were flooded. Water everywhere. One of our cars got stuck, we had to get towed. We pivoted together, making something out of the unexpected- beyond original vision.
I hold the ideas that initiate a creative work very lightly. Creative results aren’t beholden to the initiations that bring them into life, anymore than we live genuinely when beholden to what our parents think we should be.
We
steady the bow
and the arrow goes
where it will go.
And that’s good enough.
“I cannot believe how uninhibited I felt shooting with Ashley. I have SO MANY issues with how I see myself and my appearance in real life AND in photos and I didn’t care about that at all during the shoot. Those concerns that feel like bricks were not even present. I had COMPLETE trust that whatever we were going to create together, I would love.
Ashley also created an EXPERIENCE that provided absolute specific intention and purpose for the shoot. This was not about taking "cute photos where I hopefully look thin to myself and others," NO, not one single ounce of that. This was about something so much more, about documenting motherhood, womanhood, and the human details of my life at this very moment with two heaping scoops of my unique style & personality - none of which is actually tangible and CAN ONLY be presented/captured by artists alike because it is ALL a matter of interpretation.
It is not even about the physical things I wore during the shoot even though I love them, they were vehicles of sorts - this was about all the feelings, emotions, and energy I described above directly associated to the true intention of the shoot.”
Thank you, Andrea. For trusting me and yourself enough to make a magic neither of us could have made alone.
Only a few days after giving birth, shirt stained with mother’s milk as she lives and breaths the new life from inside to outside her.
This is one of the myriad ways motherhood takes and gives and changes shape. A peek into the world of motherhood, of the fourth trimester, of the hazy days so precious and heavy and fast.
This is a phase, a phrase, a holy blip of a consequential ritual with tethers that bind us from ancestor to far-flung successors.
Thank you Stephanie for letting me see and share.
Photo of Stephanie Hawkes. Find Stephanie HERE
Canvas backdrops by Ultraviolet Backdrops
