Crystal Liepa Photography: Midwest Wedding & Portrait Photographer

This week’s portraits are of my little sister. My sister is remarkable. She is expressive and creative. I try to drill in her head that being smart and compassionate trumps physical beauty. She is at the age where she still has her childhood innocence and has no clue about her own beauty, she refreshingly loves to play sports, care for animals and play outside in the dirt until sundown.

Sometimes when I photograph my sister I get criticism that she looks too ‘sexy’ the thought of this repulses me. I am not ever here to objectify anyone I shoot. Because of her beauty she will have to deal with other people’s projections all of her life. When I’m with her we play as children do; we run, we jump off of the rope swing, we laugh and holler–of course I have my camera and I photograph her silly and sometimes pensive nature. I never tell her to be a certain way, I will at times try to get her to look at the camera or do something silly, but that is it for direction. The rest is all her own theatricality and expression.

I would never compare myself to Sally Mann, but I would say her photographs will always be archetypal to me and I think she hit on something real when she photographed her own children. I think with the flurry of child beauty pageants Americans have really tried to doll up and age their young girls–whereas Sally Mann’s photographs capture a truth about the freedom and innocence of her children for example when they swam naked in the lake–Mann was not trying to sexually objectify or exploit her children like many people do in pageantry and often in mainstream dance competitions.

Enough on the politics of female objectification let’s get back to portraits. I think my sister is incredible and I love bouncing around with her, she constantly inspires me and has me laughing until I cry.