How To Eat A Snowball

Model: Carla Johnson (Unbearable-Lightness)
Photographer: Josefina
Copyright © Josefina Photography 2012 

As the photographer, I have to say the shoot was both something enlightening and exhilarating. The photos that I got from said shoot are not ones that you would see when you stop to think about 60-somes in an outdoor setting. Especially in wintertime. Yet, you can learn a lot from a single series with these two women. Both defy the meaning of "being 60," both defy the younger minds standards of "you're too old for sex & you're too old to be sexy."

If there is anything that Lightness is good at, it's taking something that has already been done & undoing to re-do. The idea of eating snow is not a 'new age' thing. We've all done it. Perhaps we were four or five and were out building snowmen, but we did it. But the idea of eating snow in a bustier and boots in the way that Lightness does it...that's, well that's new. It's extraordinary to watch a model go from being reserved -preparing for a shoot in her mind- and then completely changing to make the scene come alive. Especially when the model has chemistry with the camera & the photographer.

That is always the key. If there is no chemistry, the photographer is going to get a shit shot, no matter what. But if there is a connection, the things that come alive in front of a lens is remarkable. And the work that I do aims to display that. I don't play by the rules of photography. I blow out light when and if I need to. I don't always pay attention to the ISO or other technical aspects of the camera, because it takes away from the life of the shoot. The point of me shooting is to get art. Art that I see, art that the model sees in the way that we intended to bring it to life.

So the idea of undoing an age-old idea of eating snow, to re-do it is captivating. And if that means that Lightness is crouching in the snow, giving me the "come-hither" look, in a bustier and boots while licking & swallowing a snow ball, then that is just how that magic spell is released. Somewhere within this crazy idea & setting, we are going to get that 'money shot,' and it will be the one that defies all meaning of any remote 'natural order'.