Photographer Jade Beall is known for her candid and unedited nude
photos of men and women of all ages, races and sizes. Her new portraits
of a nude couple in their 70s which are part of her new series
showcasing the bodies of people who are over the age of 60, have taken
the internet by storm.
Thousands admire the way the images perfectly captures the remarkable
love they have for each other. Gerry and Darwin, who have been in love
for more than 20 years, proudly leave their wrinkles and sagging skin on
display as they hold each other in the heartwarming images meant to
inspire self-love and challenge society’s definitions of beauty.Speaking
against critics of anything nude, she wrote,
“I refuse to accept the wide spread (mostly Western) human belief system
in regards to what is beautiful, especially when it comes to the sacred
vessel we call our body. Why do we accept to believe that one thing
must be more beautiful than another? Why cannot we embrace a
million-billion definitions of beautiful? The divine: skin that drapes,
stretches, sags, wrinkles, burns and rebuilds like spiraling Fibonacci
across our fragile and strong bones made from the same stuff as the
stars all combining to create this phenomenon that comes to life for a
short amount of time that we call… bodies.
Many from my human tribe and other humans who wish to sell me things
“that will hide the evidence that I am growing older” tell me that as I
grow older, I am worth less and less and that elder bodies are anything
but beautiful. These elder bodies: the temples to decades of wisdom,
heartbreak, strength, failure, triumph, THRIVING. How, I wonder, could
they be anything but beautiful? I am starting a new series on beloveds
over 60 because I wish to be free from the imposed beliefs.”
