Who We Become

2016 — Ongoing

Who We Become is an ongoing portrait project exploring the relationships, experiences and influences that shape Black women’s lives and identities.

The project began from an interest in the women we look towards as role models and the ways ideas of Black womanhood are formed through family, friendship, culture and lived experience. Through portraiture and conversation, I became interested in how each woman understood herself in relation to the people and experiences that had shaped her.

The work also considers the ways Black women are perceived from the outside, particularly through stereotypes surrounding race and gender. Rather than allowing those assumptions to define the women photographed, the project centres their own experiences, relationships and sense of self.

As the project continues, I am interested in the space between how we are seen and how we understand ourselves: the people we inherit from, the people we choose, the experiences we carry and the ways these relationships contribute to who we become.