I’ve been photographing my daughter and nieces for over a decade. There’s something sacred about the lives of girls, and their innocent, confident relationships to themselves, their world and one another is gravitational. Between them is an intimate and spiritual knowledge, both ordinary and extraordinary, and I aim to capture the brilliance of their communion. I hope when they look back on this work, they’ll see their beauty, and their devotion to each other, and find themselves here, in this work we made together, reflected with love.

The girls have grown up within the frame. Over time their relationship to being photographed has shifted. They became collaborators and have helped with editing, location choice, and offer feedback about where the work should travel. As they matured, and became more confident talking about race, we’ve been able to discuss the impact of contributing images to the photo world that bear witness to humanity and illuminates the need for representation that is neither stereotypical or trendy.

There are notable bodies of work about girlhood, but Cousins is unique. It chronicles the lives of girls of color, which is a perspective that still remains under-embraced. Additionally, each frame is wholly female. Angst, distraction or dating does not enter the frame. Instead it’s their connection that stays in focus, their adolescent changes are organic, subtle and unprovocative. Lastly, the girls are invested. They all agree that they want the project to continue – they want to have a visual presence.

Kristen Emack is a 2022 Guggenheim Fellow, a MacDowell Fellow,
a Mass Cultural Council Fellow, and a Saint Botolph Fellow. Her debut book, Cousins, was published in 2023 by L’Artiere.

kristenjoyemack.com

In contemporary photography, girls and young women are often shown in
relation to cultural forces outside of themselves - towering pressures like
beauty standards, consumerism, or the masculine gaze. These struggles
are ubiquitous, and it’s an important work for artists to confront them. But
feminine identity in these depictions, perhaps by accident, becomes defined
by its relationship to external powers.

Kristen Joy Emack portrays girlhood a subtle but distinctly different
anchoring. She approaches the four girls in Cousins with a positive vision,
with respect for their growing souls. The girls are presented as themselves,
with reverence and very little artifice. The quiet, open nature of their self-
presentation is not rooted in turmoil, boys, performance, imitation, or
even giddy joy, and this feels unusual. Maybe, we are not used to seeing
photographs of girls just being.

The cousins’ physical closeness reads as foundational security. Their embraces
act like puzzle pieces, rearranging themselves into elegant formations as we
move through the photographs. Emack’s choice to make the whole series in
black and white strips out distraction, focusing further in, on their gestures of
connection.

Although the girls are most often pictured together, Emack includes a few
individual portraits in the series. One of the girls is shown cocooned in ear
muffs with her eyes closed. Astonishingly, the circular shape of her irises and
traces of the whites of the eye appear visible beneath her eyelids, as if her eyes
were simultaneously open and closed. Emack may have used a long exposure
to catch the eyes in motion, or it may be a recipe of illusion, made from
shadow, contour, and light. Either way, the effect is startling once it’s seen.