Simplicity Isn’t a Trend. It’s a Refusal.
Simplicity Isn’t a Trend. It’s a Refusal.
What to expect
I’m sharing my short and honest take on what becomes possible when choose to stop doing filling the frame with unnecessary noise, and instead focus on being present in the moment, in a raw and honest way. To use a great cliche, less is truly more and this is how it applies to my approach as a photographer.
TL;DR
The images you actually want don’t need more styling, more locations, more production.
They need less of a forced performance and compassion for who you already are.
PORTRAIT: SU
We have been taught that more is the answer.
More styling. More locations. More production value. More photoshopping. A mood board with forty references and an outfit for every one of them. And sure some inspiration collecting is great, but when do we focus on being present vs. creating endless lists of all the things required to try and be present. There is also a very strong chance that what we are trying to create that is supposed to be all about you, that will get lost in all of the details and complications we are adding, instead of just focusing on the precious details of who you are.
We’ve been tought to show up ready to perform.
Not because we’re vain. Because we’re human. Because we’ve absorbed so much imagery that is telling us what we are supposed to look like, and we have lost to much touch with what it actually feels like to be in our bodies, and be fully present. I’ve thought about this a lot as a photographer and I think that it’s easier to feel safe when the frame is full and busy and complicated, because we are less of the subject and more of an object blended into a scene.
When there’s so much going on, that’s when the real human in the frame gets obscured.
I understand it. I’ve watched it happen. I’ve done it myself.
Before I go further I also need to name something as I feel like it has to be said: simplicity has been co-opted. Minimalism as a trend has a way of flattening everything into the same neutral palette, the same clean lines, the same quiet erasure of anything too particular, too loud, too much. That’s not what I’m talking about here, and certainly not what I want to do. If anything I want to amplify who you are through simplicity, not strip parts of you away.
What I’m talking about is a refusal of consumption, and a refusal of buying into this idea that you need to be something or should I say SOMEONE you are not. Of encouraging you to show up as you, not as a version of you that comes out of a moodboard of images of anyone but you. Get what I’m saying?
You can be electric. Loud in every colour. Completely yourself. Simplicity, or at least the way I see it, is not about asking you to soften who you are, in fact quite the opposite.
PORTRAIT: roxanna
Simplicity is in the details that already exist within you.
I know you’ve heard this a million times before, but there truly ony is one YOU. And all of your little details are the characteristics that make you uniquely you, cliche but it’s true!
It’s your hands. Your dimples. Your freckles. Your scars and your wrinkles. The low of your back. The way you scrunch your nose when you laugh. The way you hold yourself when no one’s asking anything of you. These aren’t supporting details, these are parts of what me you you.
But getting there to embrace all these elements, that takes something because it’s not easy to do with all the years of social conditioning, though it is possible.
It takes a willingness to ask yourself an honest question: are you ready to fully embrace you are, as you are. Are you ready to see your so called imperfections as your charm? Are you able to let go of an illusive idea of perfection to be present in your body and not give a flying f*ck about what others think?
That’s the choice. And it’s a bold one.
Because stepping toward simplicity, toward what’s real, means stepping away from everything you’ve been told around how you should show up in this world, especially on camera. It means rejecting all that nonsense that you need to be fixed, and look a certain way, to boldly saying this is me.
That’s the power of artistry. Not in the complexity. In the courage to arrive without all of the extra stuff and take up space as you are.
Thanks for Reading!
Hi, I’m Michele Mateus, award-winning photographer based in Vancouver, BC creating bold, evocative, portraits with an editorial flair for people who want anything but ordinary.
If something here hit the right note, let’s talk!
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