Laurence Philomene, a 24-year-old photographer, was at the tail-end of a long curatorial project she had been working on when the idea for her Non-Binary Portrait Series first came to mind. Taking a moment to think about the kind of work she wasn’t seeing out there in the world, it occurred to her that respectful, non-exploitive transgender representation was something the art world seemed to seriously be lacking in. Laurence, who herself identifies as non-binary using she/her and they/them pronouns, found that oftentimes transgender representation in the media is parasitic — artists, publishers, and companies sometimes use transgender bodies as a token for social credit. These projects fail to consult transgender and queer people on how they wish to be portrayed, producing what can be exploitive and emotionally destructive results. To combat this, Laurence decided to embark on a project that would take a more collaborative approach, capturing transgender people in her community as they wish to be seen.

Before each session Laurence asked her models, “what is your ideal self?” She then photographed them in the outfits and environments they felt characterized this image. We caught up with Laurence to talk about what it means to portray transgender people the right way.