Hellen van Meene

Puberty is a limbo–a state of physical and emotional transition, an uncertain place between melancholy and hope, fear of loss and excitement about the new, surrendering one‘s identity and defining oneself anew. Hellen van Meene’s portraits of adolescents are multi-layered visual metaphors for that in-between period during which childhood is being left behind.

With carefully-staged poses taken in soft light with gentle colouring, van Meene explores the boundary between the world of childish fantasy and adult life. The careful observation and intuitive understanding that these photographs display make them unique psychograms, and, with their technically-perfect realisation, photographic masterpieces.