Loah: ‘on Instagram, we project our insecurities and desire for acceptance and perfection’
by Holly O'Neill
20th Nov 2019
20th Nov 2019
From the November issue of IMAGE, six Irish women reflect on what beauty means to them.
What is beauty today? For the last three years, photographer Lee Malone’s passion project has been to challenge perceptions of beauty by capturing women in their most natural, make-up-free state. In the November issue of IMAGE, he photographed six women who opened up to Holly O’Neill about what beauty means to them. Here, Loah tells her story.
PORTRAITS BY LEE MALONE
Loah, musician and actress
“Social media is a great blessing in modern life because it connects people, families and communities.
But because it is us, humans, using it, we project our many insecurities and our desire for acceptance and perfection onto it. This can affect both ourselves and others and leave us feeling empty.
I adore dressing up, I adore make-up and I, like anyone, love to show the most extravagant “highlights reel” of my life.
As I’ve gotten older, I appreciate in equal measure the laid-back moments, the moments in life where it is okay, it is beautiful, to be just as you are and let the inner (high)light shine, to surrender the mask.
This shoot was an ideal vehicle for that: an affirmation of the unadorned self, which has the truest value of any and all versions we can conjure.”
Lee Malone is hoping to publish his Perceptions of Beauty book of portraits next year with money raised going towards various women’s mental health and domestic abuse charities. @lee_malone_photography
This article originally appeared in the November issue of IMAGE Magazine.
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