Midwest.

> Editorial + Documentary Photographer

> Multimedia Journalist

(617) 372-3557
hello@bernadettephoto.com
@thebernadettefox

YOU’RE REALLY PRETTY
Minneapolis, Minn. USA. 2019.

This project explores identity and non-conformity through an individual’s unique experience of embracing a non-binary existence. Although it’s challenging to determine how many people identify as non-binary in the United States (given the current lack of identity options on legal paperwork), a 2018 Pew Research Center survey concluded that 35% of Generation Z (born after 1996) say that they personally know someone who uses gender-neutral pronouns such as “they” and “them”. The photographs and interviews document the day-to-day reality of the choice to break from our social and cultural beliefs in two distinct, disconnected and opposite forms of masculine and feminine, in favor of discovering a new way of being in the world. Created in partnership with @_pretty_boi_ray and @thealdrichtattoo.

>> Download the Project PDF here.

Ray is a 31-year old, non-binary, queer person and full-time artist working in both sculpture and tattoo arts. Here, they prepare custom artwork for a friend’s tattoo session. Ray lives in Minneapolis, Minn. with their bulldog, Frances.

Ray made the transition from identifying as female to non-binary in January 2019. They had been thinking about it for over 9 years; “This was a thing that I just knew, beginning with childhood vibes.”

Adjective: non-binary – denoting or relating to a gender or sexual identity that is not defined in terms of traditional binary oppositions such as male and female or homosexual and heterosexual.

“It was always in my brain, but I didn’t have the vocabulary for it before. I first came out as bi-sexual, then I found my queer family and then I finally had the words to explain what I had been struggling with my whole life.”

“Because I now identify as non-binary… I can dress any way, and present any way, be male or female, be nothing or both. It is such a relief.” Ray on the front porch of their apartment in Uptown, Minneapolis, Minn.

“I only got on Tinder recently and it was because I had just gone through this transition and I was feeling a lot of feelings and I needed to know that I could still connect with someone romantically.”

“When I released myself from being defined as a woman, all of a sudden I could feel very pretty. I could look in the mirror and say ‘I’m neither of you and I’m both of you’.” Ray consults with a client in their tattoo studio, The Aldrich, where the motto is “Respect Every Body”.

“When I first started asking people to use ‘They/Them’ pronouns with me, most of my friends said they had seen it coming for a long time and weren’t surprised. They were like, ‘Yes! Finally!’.” The restroom outside of Ray’s workplace.

“I’ve spent so long trying to fit in with other people’s shit, and now that I know myself I’m like, ‘Fuck it. I’ll die for it’. Of course I’d love for it to be easy, but I would rather have the life that I want. And that’s what it is for most of us in 2019–it’s just not the same dream that our parents had.”

Rachel Andrzejewski, 2018. Ray Andrzejewski, 2019.

“There are definitely people who–when you give them your new name–they simply don’t believe you. And they will even say to me, ‘Is that your real name?’. And I’m thinking, ‘What? Why? You are literally meeting a human for the first time and they told you their name’.”

“Non-binary includes a lot of little nuances and for each person–it’s just about what terms make them feel the most comfortable. But, basically it means that I’m not interested in being defined by either male or female, not being defined by my genitalia. There are things that I want to be able to fully reject or embrace–or any nuance of them–and being non-binary gives me a lot more room to feel and behave the way I want to.”