How America’s girls want you to see them

The Belgian photographer and filmmaker Eva Verbeeck credits the shaping of her adolescent years to two singular pop culture supernovas: singers Christina Aguilera and Britney Spears. “Especially Britney,” Verbeeck shared on a recent video call. “She really had this lore around her of the ‘American girl.’” Like many women whose formative years coincided with the late ‘90s and early ‘00s –– and for those who a US cultural influence was tangible mostly via traditional media like film and TV, music videos and magazines –– teen pop idols were an obvious entry point for establishing what girlhood looked like Stateside.

Growing up in Tessenderlo, a small farming town about 44 miles outside of Brussels, Verbeeck’s early references were pulled largely from glossy publications like Vanity Fair, Vogue and Elle, acquired at her local bookstore: she would pore over their pages before ripping out the best ones to stick on her bedroom wall. “The US is a huge export of pop culture and the mythology around it, and visually that was the start of being really excited about America,” she said. “Later I was consuming American TV shows about high schoolers, which was fascinating because it was so far from my own world at the time. The whole thing became this kind of escape.”

Two decades on, this relationship with the country’s culture and aesthetics, and her notion of an imagined ‘American Girl,’ would inform a six-year project that saw Verbeeck photograph 400 young women and girls aged between six and 18 across 28 US states. Titled “America’s Girls, On the Edge of a Dream,” the series is released this month as a monograph by GOST Books, with accompanying exhibitions taking place at Cultuurcentrum De Factorij in Belgium and the Savannah Center for Photography in Georgia, in the US.

In 2018, when Verbeeck initiated the project, she had been living in America for several years and was working as a photojournalist; her job typically involved short term, fast paced assignments in the political arena. “America’s Girls” was an opportunity to lean into a more intimate, personal practice where she could explore gender and identity, as well as reflect on the concept of girlhood while challenging the narrative she had observed in her own adolescence. Moreover, the portrait series allowed Verbeeck to engage directly with the contemporary experiences of young women and girls living in America.

“I remember taking the first photo and thinking how perfect it was’” said Verbeeck, recalling the moment she photographed 11-year-old Jazmine, a cheerleader with the Savannah Sharks (now based between Brussels and Amsterdam, the photographer was living in Georgia at the time). “In this cheerleading school with sequins everywhere – teenage me could not even imagine.” In the portrait, which subsequently became the book’s cover, Jazmine’s eyelids are painted blue to match the accents of her Sharks uniform, and she cautiously holds the camera’s gaze. Her youth is obvious, undoing the unattainable, often heavily sexualized image of cheerleaders immortalized on screen throughout Verbeeck’s teens, then typically portrayed by adult women.

Working with a large format camera that dictated the pace of each shoot, Verbeeck introduced herself to potential sitters with open calls to schools, clubs, youth groups and local organizers. Adamant that in each instance the girl should genuinely want to partake –– and the series not be shaped by her own eye –– she rejected street casting, furthermore inviting teens and pre-teens to have their portrait taken with an object or article of clothing tied to their character. Beyond cheerleaders, she photographed members of marching bands, various sports teams, and local girl scouts, while other participants chose to be pictured with pets, wearing a favorite item of clothing, or simply beside their best friend. One girl brought her new bike, received just the day before, another turned up with some rocks.

“It’s very different from how we’ve perceived women in art, or how we’ve been depicted throughout history, when women were either going to be married off or they were a muse or daughter of nobility,” said the photographer, relaying the significance of the props and the agency embedded in the outfits. “Traditionally their names were never mentioned and they wouldn’t have chosen what they were wearing –– it was forced, or the artist made it up. Trying to change that narrative, saying ‘I care about how you want to be seen,’ was important, and eventually it became an important piece of the puzzle.”

Speaking to the girls at length, learning about their interests and the way they view themselves, Verbeeck found that conversation was paramount. And while the participants were intrigued by her camera, the photographs themselves were often secondary. “This generation has been photographed a lot, they have a lot of photos of themselves, and a lot of photos of themselves they like,” she explained, referencing the way camera phones and social media have made making and distributing images commonplace. “But because young women often aren’t taken seriously, me as an adult being genuinely curious became this beautiful interaction. Mostly the girls just wanted you to listen to their opinions.”

“They feel a lot of responsibility,” she continued, reflecting on the abundance of 24-hour news made accessible via platforms like Instagram and TikTok. “I heard a lot of girls talk about being scared of climate change or war. There’s so much information coming at that generation, it’s very different from when I grew up.” While the conversations themselves are not included in “America’s Girls” –– nor are the subjects’ locations provided alongside their name and age –– they inevitably shaped the work, establishing trust between the photographer and the participants, that in turn created the central thread of Verbeeck’s warm approach. “There is a lot of power in giving deliberate and direct attention to young women, and a real need within their community to be seen, which is what this project is about.”

比利时摄影师兼电影制作人伊娃·维尔贝克 (Eva Verbeeck) 将她青春期的塑造归功于两位独树一帜的流行文化巨星：歌手克里斯蒂娜·阿奎莱拉 (Christina Aguilera) 和布兰妮·斯皮尔斯 (Britney Spears)。“尤其是布兰妮，”维尔贝克在最近的一次视频通话中说道，“她身上真的有一种‘美国女孩’的传奇色彩。” 和许多成长于上世纪90年代末和本世纪初的女性一样——对于那些主要通过电影、电视、音乐录影带和杂志等传统媒体接触到美国文化影响的人来说——青少年流行偶像显然是她们了解美国少女生活样貌的切入点。

维尔贝克在距离布鲁塞尔约44英里的小镇泰森德洛长大，那里是一个小型农业城镇。她早期的灵感主要来源于《名利场》、《Vogue》和《Elle》等时尚杂志，这些杂志都是她在当地书店淘来的：她会仔细翻阅，然后把最喜欢的页面撕下来贴在卧室的墙上。“美国是流行文化及其相关神话的巨大输出国，从视觉上来说，这让我开始对美国真正着迷，”她说。“后来我开始看美国高中生的电视剧，这很吸引我，因为它与我当时的真实世界截然不同。这一切都成了我逃离现实的一种方式。”

二十年后，她与美国文化和美学的这种联系，以及她对“美国女孩”这一想象的构想，促成了她一项历时六年的项目。在这个项目中，维贝克在美国28个州拍摄了400名年龄在6至18岁之间的年轻女性和女孩。这组名为《美国女孩，梦的边缘》的作品集于本月由GOST Books出版发行，同时，比利时的德法克托里文化中心和美国佐治亚州的萨凡纳摄影中心也将举办相应的展览。

2018年，当维贝克启动这个项目时，她已在美国生活多年，是一名摄影记者；她的工作通常是在政治领域执行短期、快节奏的任务。“美国女孩”项目让她有机会深入探索一种更为私密、个人化的创作方式，从而得以探索性别和身份认同，反思“少女时代”的概念，并挑战她在自己青春期所观察到的叙事模式。此外，这组肖像作品也让维贝克能够直接接触到生活在美国的年轻女性和女孩的当代经历。

“我记得拍下第一张照片时，心想这简直太完美了，”维尔贝克回忆起她为11岁的贾兹敏拍摄的那一刻。贾兹敏是萨凡纳鲨鱼啦啦队的队员（当时维尔贝克住在佐治亚州，而现在这支队伍的总部设在布鲁塞尔和阿姆斯特丹之间）。“这所啦啦队学校里到处都是亮片——我这个十几岁的少女根本无法想象。” 这张照片后来成为了这本书的封面。照片中，贾兹敏的眼睑涂成了蓝色，与她鲨鱼队队服上的点缀相呼应，她小心翼翼地直视着镜头。她的稚嫩显而易见，打破了维尔贝克青少年时期银幕上那些遥不可及、往往被过度性化的啦啦队员形象——当时的啦啦队员通常由成年女性扮演。

维贝克使用一台大画幅相机，拍摄节奏完全由相机决定。她通过向学校、俱乐部、青年团体和当地组织者公开招募模特，以此来寻找合适的拍摄对象。她坚持认为，每个女孩都必须真心想要参与拍摄，而不是由她个人的眼光来塑造作品。因此，她拒绝街头选角，并邀请青少年和准青少年带着一件与自身性格相关的物品或衣物来拍摄肖像照。除了啦啦队员，她还拍摄了行进乐队成员、各种运动队队员和当地女童子军，其他参与者则选择与宠物合影、穿着自己最喜欢的衣服，或者只是和最好的朋友一起拍照。一个女孩带来了她前一天刚收到的新自行车，另一个女孩则带着一些石头来了。

“这与我们以往在艺术作品中对女性的认知，或者说历史上女性的形象截然不同。过去，女性要么被嫁出去，要么是缪斯女神，要么是贵族之女，”摄影师说道，并阐述了道具的重要性以及服装所蕴含的自主性。“传统上，她们的名字从未被提及，她们也无法选择自己的穿着——要么是被迫的，要么是艺术家随意设计的。试图改变这种叙事方式，表达‘我关心你希望如何被看待’，这一点至关重要，最终也成为了整个故事中不可或缺的一部分。”

通过与女孩们长时间的交谈，了解她们的兴趣爱好以及她们如何看待自己，维贝克发现对话至关重要。虽然参与者们对她的相机很感兴趣，但照片本身往往是次要的。“这一代人经常被拍照，她们有很多自己的照片，而且有很多她们喜欢的照片，”她解释道，并提到了智能手机和社交媒体使得拍摄和传播照片变得司空见惯。“但由于年轻女性的声音常常不被重视，我作为一个成年人，出于真诚的好奇心，与她们进行了一次美好的互动。大多数女孩只是希望你能倾听她们的想法。”

“她们感到肩负重任，”她继续说道，并反思了Instagram和TikTok等平台提供的24小时不间断新闻。“我听到很多女孩谈论她们对气候变化或战争的恐惧。这一代人接收到的信息量如此之大，这和我成长的年代截然不同。”虽然《美国女孩》这部作品本身并未收录这些对话——也没有提供受访者的姓名和年龄以及所在地点——但它们无疑影响了作品的创作，在摄影师和受访者之间建立了信任，而这种信任又构成了Verbeeck温暖拍摄手法的核心。“给予年轻女性刻意而直接的关注​​蕴含着巨大的力量，她们的社群也迫切需要被关注，而这正是这个项目的意义所在。”