On Beauty and Women: an Interview with Jordan Bunniie (NSFW)

In a patriarchal society, everything that women are fighting for, especially for equal rights, are often labeled radical to many; but don't discouraged by impressions. Get inspired on how American photographer Jordan Bunniie becomes her own role model through her provoking artistry and vision.

Read about Jordan's inspiring journey with photography through her interview with Lomography Magazine.

Hi Jordan! Welcome to Lomography! First thing first, we notice you like to photograph women in nude. In your own opinion, how does it empower women?

Thank you so much for having me on here. Women decide to model nude for all kinds of different reasons and one of the most common is so they can learn to love their own bodies and love who they are. It helped me with that more than I'd imagined it would. When you take a picture of a woman and you show her the things that you find beautiful about her, it can change the way she feels about herself forever.

Making the decision to pose nude for someone or hundreds or thousands of people is making a decision to take over your body. You have control over whether or not you choose to show it and you stop allowing society and the people around you to dictate whether or not it's acceptable. Making the decision to model nude can make you a much stronger person and it can make you a more confident person. I'd say that's pretty empowering.

Your photographs not only depict the natural surface of a female body, but they also have certain attitude. How do you think does the female body become a subject, instead of being objectified like in most cases in art?

Well first of all thank you so much for saying that it's a huge compliment. I really try hard not to objectify the people who model for me, I know whay it's like to feel objectified in photos and it's not the best feeling. I wish I had a quick answer for this one. I guess I just shoot in a way that I would want to be shot.

As a woman yourself, what's the favorite part of the body you like to take photos of? Why?

This is probably a little bit of an unexpected answer but my absolute favorite thing to shoot on a person is their hands. Your hands say everything about you, it's just fascinating to me. I wouldn't be surprised if one day I did entire series just on people's hands.

My second favorite part to shoot would definitely be the face, I've developed an obsession with studying people's faces. If you pay close enough attention and you know what you're looking for you can learn everything about what they're feeling at that moment that you're looking at them.

And then my third favorite part, even though it wasn't asked for it, it would be the booty because I have yet to meet a model doesn't have a cute butt.

When composing your images, what elements do you usually look for in portraiture?

If you take out all the technical stuff, I'm looking for moments. I know it sounds really cheesy, but that's what I do, whoever I'm taking photos of just comes over or we meet up and we just hang out and I get to know them and we do things that we go have food or go on an adventure and when they do something that's interesting I shoot it.

If we don't really have the ability to do that and it's a more restricting situation with not a lot of time, if I'm just shooting portraits of their face and just sit them down and we chat and I pick up my camera and shoot them when they're talking about something that they really care about and they have actual emotion in their face.

Another thing we notice is there's a strong, tough and controlling gaze coming from the eyes of your subjects. Do you usually direct them on what to do or does that come naturally?

For a couple of them they're just natural at giving that look, they just are absolutely talented human beings. The rest of the time but I do honestly it's just kind of hold the camera but their face for an uncomfortably long amount of time and it... everybody's reaction is a little bit different but the look in their eyes always tend to be the same.

What aspect of your work do you enjoy most?

Hands down getting to hear the things people tell me while we shoot. People have a lot they can teach you if you let them. It's also an incredible feeling having them be comfortable enough with me to get personal at times. People have come over and spent the whole time venting about things going on with them, or sharing stories about their families, their past. I love it both because it's cool to learn things about these individuals and because when they start really talking to me, that's when I get the best stuff from them.

Who or what are the things that inspire you with your craft?

The person I am shooting at the time, The environment around us, and extremely random objects.

Lastly, what are you currently up to right now? Any work-in-progress you'd like us to know about?

I'm working on a portrait project right now, very much in the style I talked about earlier. I'm getting as many interesting faces, mostly non models, as I can and shooting a roll and a handful of Polaroids each. I'm not entirely sure where I'll be taking it just yet.

I'm also working on something a bit more personal to me, a friend took me to see some work at moma, bought me a roll of film and asked me to shoot the moments I would not normally shoot.. More intimate moments with friends and lovers.

If you enjoyed our talk with Jordan, read our feature or visit her Facebook, Tumblr and Instagram for more of her works. Images are with permission from Jordan Bunniie.

written by Ciel Hernandez on 2016-11-06 #people #analogue-photography #portraiture #film-photography #portrait-photography #jordan-bunniie