Photographing the Female

Photographing the Female is a global project and exhibition that explores female identity and representation in photography through the insight of contemporary lens-based artists. Formed to reflect on the diverse state, condition and role of the female around the world today; it uses the power of photography to start conversation and inspire new ways of seeing.

The Photographing The Female exhibition brings together the work of empowering voices from all around the world whose photographic practices all explore a contemporary female experience via historically central themes like the body, sense of self, conformity and stigmatization. The photographers speak to us from a myriad of vantage points uncovering social and personal realities that challenge perceptions of what it means to be female and forces the viewer to consider the consequences of society’s prescribed roles. Despite radical differences in style and approach an inescapable universality permeates the exhibition reminding us that the female is intrinsically connected to all of us and our very existence.

From the intimate experiences to painstaking criticism of patriarchal culture to the rare insight into the lives of teen girls these are all stories defined by power, transformation, culture, and struggle. In the juxtaposition of so many different perspectives it becomes clear that female identity is a complex and fluid concept which holds no ultimate truth or definition.

The framework for Photographing the Female exists in the space between photography, memory and identity. As extensions of the human experience and memory photographs are visual archives of power and privilege though which we reflect, identify and ultimately understand our collective and individual selves. The stories put forward are ultimately the stories we deem important enough for the rest of the world to see. Photographing the Female is a reflection on the role of the photographic archive in a contemporary world of images and the importance to history and our common future of bringing female narratives to the forefront of social storytelling.

Beacon Gallery will be partnering with Resilient Sisterhood Project for duration of the exhibition.  Resilient Sisterhood Project is a non-profit created to inform and empower women of African descent regarding common but rarely discussed diseases of the reproductive system that disproportionately affect them. 

In an effort to support RSP’s mission Beacon Gallery will hold an event in May to spread awareness and support of Resilient Sisterhood Project’s mission and also plan to donate a portion of the proceeds from the exhibition.

List of artists: 

Tasneem Alsultan (Saudi Arabia/US)

Malene Anthony (Denmark)

Poulomi Basu (India)

Abdollah Heidari (Iran)

Jamie Knowlton (US)

Andy Margetson (UK)

Natasha Penaguiao (Denmark)

Birthe Piontek (Germany)

Mavi Phillips (US)

Mafalda Rakos (Austria)

Marie Schuller (Germany/UK)

Paul Shiakallis (South Africa)

Prarthna Singh (India)

Georgia Stockwell (US)

Daro Sulakauri (Georgia)

Luo Yang (China)

Ji Yeo (South Korea)

Alexandra Von Fuerst (Italy)

Sara Zanella (Italy)

Alena Zhandarova (Russia)