Photo: Cindy Marler/Hollandse Hoogte — Hellen van Meene
Hellen van Meene (Alkmaar, 1972) has achieved worldwide success with her portraits of adolescent girls and women. Her photographs—the work of the ‘lepidopterist of puberty,’ as she has been nicknamed—evoke conflicting emotions: they are moving, yet also unsettling.
In 1992, Van Meene began studying photography at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam. After a period at the College of Art in Edinburgh, Scotland, she completed her studies in 1996. By then, she had already taken her first steps into the exhibition world, having made her debut in 1994.
Her talent did not go unnoticed, earning Van Meene the Charlotte Köhler Prize for young artists in 1999. That same year, the renowned Photographers’ Gallery in London gave her space for her first solo exhibition abroad. Another milestone followed two years later, when Van Meene was nominated for the highly regarded Citibank Private Bank Photography Prize.
Although Van Meene leaves nothing to chance and does not hesitate to stage every aspect of her photographs—from posture and expression to clothing—her photographic approach can be described as intuitive: it is about the atmosphere in her work and her connection with her models.
This ‘seemingly instinctive’ way of working is evident, for example, in her explanation of why she prefers to photograph young girls on the threshold of adulthood. She describes them as an open age group, at a stage when they are not yet set in their ways and remain playful and uninhibited. When asked, Van Meene says that young people possess a touching openness that allows them to be themselves.
Her work has not been free from criticism; some have accused her photographs of occasionally having pornographic overtones involving children. Van Meene is troubled by that suggestion. ‘I also take nude photographs, not portraits of children, but photographs of young people. I make sure not to photograph genitals. Partly because I find things more beautiful and interesting when they are concealed, and partly because genitals can distract people from what you want to communicate; some people can no longer look clearly. But I will still not shy away from bare breasts.’
A second criticism of Van Meene’s work is whether it is art or merely a formula. Despite the negative reactions, her photographs have won acclaim around the world and are held, for example, by the Museum of Modern Art in New York. She is praised for her sense of light, her unusual and disorienting use of clothing in combination with backgrounds, and her models’ poses—as though the photographs were paintings. She had also mounted numerous solo exhibitions, from the United States and Japan to several European countries, including the Venice Biennale, as well as Amsterdam.
Where Is She Now?
At the time of publication, the career of Hellen van Meene, who lived in Heiloo, was advancing rapidly and her name was appearing around the world. Despite fierce competition from other women photographers, she ranked fourth on Elsevier’s 2007 list of successful artists. The American magazine Village Voice also included her book Portraits among the 25 best photography books published in 2005.
