aperio (Latin):
to uncover, lay bare, reveal
The Aperio Project began eight years ago. My roommate at the time suggested, “Why don’t you stop wearing make-up for a few weeks and see if you can accept yourself as beautiful without it?” Though I was skeptical, her challenge intrigued me. My morning routine of eye shadow and mascara came to a halt. I squinted at myself in the mirror and thought, “You look plain.” But slowly, over the course of several weeks, I saw a simpler beauty. Not bold or glamorous. Instead, I saw myself with a deeper clarity. Through the lens of my newly bare eyes, I glimpsed a grace to accept my skin and—more importantly—to accept all of myself as enough.
In her essay In the Name of Beauty, sociologist Tressie McMillan Cottom writes, “beauty isn’t exactly what you look like; beauty is the preferences that reproduce the existing social order.” Preferences such as full lips, thick eyebrows, rosy cheeks, glossy hair, and a slim waist. Our image-driven culture pressures women to live up to these implicit beauty ideals, ideals that are not always diverse and inclusive. They are defined by social hierarchies, and kept in place by those in power.
The Aperio Project exists to disrupt the dominant cultural beauty standards. Standards that require perfection. Standards that fail to honor the complexity of our humanity.
What if true beauty is found in embracing our imperfections, embracing the wonder of being a human in process? Irish priest and philosopher John O’Donohue asserted that “beauty isn’t all about nice loveliness. Beauty is about more rounded, substantial becoming…beauty in that sense is about an emerging fullness, a greater sense of grace and elegance, a deeper sense of depth.”
A celebration of true beauty embraces flaws on skin and tired eyes that glisten with love and loss. More valuable than looking youthful and eliminating circles under eyes is the process of becoming whole. And that process of becoming whole looks like learning to accept yourself as beautiful just as you are.
As I sit with these photos of women from all walks of life, I can’t help but notice the beauty found within every stage of their becoming.
There is beauty in the strength I see in Sarah’s face as she holds grief in tension with hope.
There is beauty in the determination I see in Stef’s face as she champions her children’s well-being, working tirelessly to provide them the healing they need.
There is beauty in the joy I see in Emily’s laughter as she goes through transition, living with uncertainty but choosing trust.
As you spend time with these photographs, I hope you see the innate beauty that each of these women exudes.
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever: Its loveliness increases; it will never pass into nothingness.
– John Keats
Beauty is complex and multifaceted. But the great shame about how we talk about beauty is that we often see it only in terms of the physical – that which meets the eye. But I think when most of us “feel” most beautiful, is when we’re confident, when we’re happy, when we’re doing something that is kind and compassionate and loving; something that doesn’t necessarily have to do with our appearance. At the end of the day, it’s not anyone else’s responsibility to make you feel beautiful; it’s yours. And despite all the science, all the social constructions, all the rhetoric, all the marketing, all the magazines, I think feeling beautiful comes down to believing that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts; that you – all of you – is much greater than any imperfections that you may have.
And that’s something beautiful that we can all work on.