Amazing post from Lesley over at Fatshionista talking about her relationship to the self portrait. For well over a year now, she has been posting photos of herself (in impeccable dress) regularly to her flickr. She writes,
In my mind, I can draw a clear line between my inclination toward self-portraits and the Jenny Craig polaroid from all those years ago. Even the more remedial images that I take, ostensibly just to record the day’s outfit, are all actually stunning reenactments of that Jenny Craig polaroid – standing full length, back to the wall, remembering everything I was wearing, again and again and again. My Jenny Craig portrait was such a sad picture, such a painfully, pitifully sad moment captured and clipped to my file as a constant weekly reminder of why I was there. The picture said, “I don’t know what else to do.” The picture said, “I am taking the action I’m supposed to take, the action the whole damn world has directed me towards.” That choice was not in my heart. I always had other options; I could stop being afraid, hating myself, punishing my body. But I didn’t know these options existed. I didn’t even know.
That is it, right there. There are always possibilities for ourselves which we have yet to imagine.
