In part two of our conversation with Barcelona-based photographer, Violet Lambies, we’re discussing Violet’s relationship with her body over the years – including the challenges presented by eating disorders and the ways she’s managed to overcome these issues to feel “bigger and better” than ever before – and we also reflect on the ways these experiences have shaped Violet’s approach to photographing the human form.
(Trigger Warning: Please be aware that our conversation with Violet contains references to eating disorders).
Britain Uncovered: Hi Violet! Having spent much of your life living either in Spain or the UK, how would you assess the similarities and differences in cultural attitudes towards body image? There’s often a perception that mainland Europe is a lot more liberal (perhaps due to nudity being commonplace on beaches), but is this your experience also?
Violet: Whilst we have nudist beaches, unfortunately I don’t think it’s representative of body image or that everyone’s okay with how other people look. In Spain there’s a lot of judgement on women and weight; and weight in general, actually.
You will find older Spanish people saying, “Oh my god, I can’t believe I gained X kilos”, and, “How is it that you’re eating this much” – and I did not find this in the UK at all. My experiences were completely different, and weight or food was never thought about in that sense. Obviously I know that these attitudes still exist, but in the environment that I grew up in Spain, girls specifically were expected to be super skinny to the point where it was genuinely concerning. And if you weren’t a certain way, or if you weren’t seen within those boundaries of weight, it was horrendous.
You cannot believe the comments that I have heard about others in Spain. People passing down the street – often those older than me – will comment, “Oh my god, I can’t believe they’re wearing that... that’s disgusting.” And I’ll think, “What is going on? This should not be a normal thing. You don’t even know this person.”
And I feel a lot safer wearing shorter clothes in the UK. In Spain, I think the culture with men is that if you’re showing skin, you’re bound to get catcalled; whilst that wasn’t my experience in Brighton. Obviously I’m not saying that it doesn’t happen, but here in Spain, it’s every time that you go out, and someone will make a comment, or someone will whistle at you. There’s something we’re doing wrong, and I genuinely can’t believe that it’s still happening.
BU: I know in the UK we’ve actually made it illegal to catcall now, and a new legislation that was issued in 2022 has brought about harsher sentences for those who deliberately harass people in a public place – which forms part of the Protection from Sex-Based Harassment in Public Bill. So in theory people could now be arrested or fined for catcalling, which seems like a really positive step forward.
Violet: So good.
BU: You mentioned in your previous answer that it’s often older people making these types of body shaming comments, so do you think there is a sense of this being a generational issue, and that younger people are more aware of the body positivity movement? Are they kinder to others, more understanding of body image issues in general and not quite so critical or judgemental?
Violet: I would love to say that that’s the case, but I don’t think it is. As generations pass, I think that we are becoming more accepting, but there’s still a lot of talk around food, and food making you fat – like that’s the only thing that can happen. There’s very toxic talk around nutrition and body image relating to it. Definitely it happens more with the older generations, but also I don’t think it’s exclusive to that.
BU: Over the years we’ve had the pleasure of speaking with many of our interviewees about their own body image journeys and their body confidence levels over the years. How would you describe your own journey in this regard, and how at ease are you feeling within your own skin today?
Violet: I don’t think I started being aware of my body image until I was 12 or 13, and around that age, I remember being really uncomfortable. I think teenagers usually feel that way. But unfortunately, because of my situation, my family and my general mental health, it wasn’t going at all well, and I developed an eating disorder. It was an unspecified eating disorder, because it wasn’t one thing or the other – but I struggled with food and starved myself, basically, until I lost a lot of weight. And that was the theme until I was 18, really.
No one noticed unless I would tell them, or unless they would see me struggle with food. And eventually it was when I went to therapy at 16 that I was diagnosed with the eating disorder.
My relationship with food is a lot better now, but I definitely have good days and bad days, like with everything. I think, ironically, my Human Vulnerability project has also allowed me to wonder if it really matters, at the end of the day. If I’m healthy, will other people’s standards of me and what I should look like really impact me that much?
And I think that’s why the problem started. Obviously it wasn’t just through one thing, but I would look at other people and not see myself in them. It was an association of, “If I don’t look like that, then it means that I don’t look good enough, and therefore I should look a specific, certain way.”
Over the years I lost a lot of weight, and then put it back on. I was later diagnosed with OCD, generalised anxiety disorder, panic disorder, depression and the unspecified eating disorder. It was a lot to handle for a 16-17 year old, and eventually it got really, really bad; to the point where I just couldn’t function as a normal human being. I wasn’t eating, I wasn’t sleeping – I just didn’t feel real.
BU: How did the situation progress from there, and how were you feeling as you headed to Brighton to start your degree shortly before the pandemic?
Violet: So they started putting me on medication. The first medication, which was sertraline, worked fine. I was on it for a year, and when I went off to uni when I was 19 I stopped taking it, because I thought, “Oh my god, I feel fine”. Wrong! I shouldn’t have done that. Obviously then the pandemic happened, so that was a whole moment. To the point where I had to call my psychiatrist and say, “Sir, I think I need something else, because this is just not going well.” My issues with food returned, and my issues with basically everything that I originally had had just not been solved.
So I got put on different medication – duloxetine and quetiapine – and the latter is an anti-psychotic medication that has a side effect that makes you gain a lot of weight. And having struggled with weight issues the majority of my life, I started seeing these changes in my body, and obviously I couldn’t really pinpoint it because so many things were happening. And I just didn’t feel good, but I didn’t actually make the connection. But I would get comments from my family – that I was gaining a lot of weight, or that I didn’t look good, for example. I actually don’t know if my diagnosis was disclosed to them, but these were the comments I was hearing.
So then I started going to the gym. At first I started going to try to lose weight, but then I fell in love with the whole process. And then I just started going because I wanted to be strong. It’s been about three years since I’ve consistently been going to the gym, but when I go it’s not for the purpose of being thin or losing weight; but rather, being strong.
Obviously now I get comments from others like, “You look too bulky”, “You have a really big back”, or whatever. But I think this is the best that I’ve felt about myself, because of the things that I can do with my body now. I’m now on the scales and looking at the numbers on the machines and how they’re going up every time, and I’m no longer thinking that it’s a negative thing. It’s such a positive.
I think that’s helped me shift my perspective on my body, and instead of using the gym in terms of wanting to feel thin or skinny, I’m actually shifting that perspective and focusing on just being strong.
BU: This is such a positive mindset to have adopted, and congratulations on all you’ve achieved and overcome to reach this stage. In many respects it’s always going to be an impossible task to meet societal standards and expectations around our bodies, and people are always going to say that we’re too big or too small, so at the end of the day, if we’re happy within ourselves – and focus more on what our bodies can do for us, rather than purely how they appear – then that’s ultimately the most important thing.
Having overcome so much of this adversity, what advice would you offer to someone who’s currently dealing with these challenges, or is maybe experiencing an eating disorder, body image issues and/or any of the other difficulties you’ve had to deal with? Would you recommend the therapy route to others too?
Violet: I’ve had my own experience with body image, and I know that it won’t be the same for other people. So obviously, what I say is just going to come from my perspective.
But yes, I was in therapy since I was 16, and I think that has helped me in such a way that I never thought possible. As we change, we grow and see things in a different way, but I don’t think it would have been possible in such a drastic way without therapy. And this is not to say that therapy will fix everything, but going to therapy is an important first step.
Unfortunately, when things like these happen to us – whether we are self-conscious about our image or whether trauma takes place – we unfortunately become responsible for the way that we are. Taking that into our own hands and trying to make it the best possible, is so important. The only person that you’re going to have around the entirety of your life is going to be yourself, and if you don’t like yourself, do you really want to be stuck with someone that you don’t like?
It’s also not about changing yourself to meet those standards, but rather trying different ways in which you can improve. Not from the point of view of changing, but learning and improving. I always say this to people that are considering going to the gym, and who want to go to lose weight. And I always have a similar response of, “Then don’t go.” Because that is not motivation enough, personally in my eyes. And when is it going to be enough? At what point are you going to stop and be like, “Actually, I’ve lost enough weight.” And then what?
I think going to the gym, or doing any sort of activity, should be to improve yourself, in a way. And I think that’s what going to the gym made me realise; that actually, instead of trying to make myself smaller, maybe I can try and make myself bigger and better! Because if you look at my body before, I wasn’t able to lift the amount of weight that I can today, and that has made me feel so empowered – and I’m literally the same weight that I was before! To the point where I was uncomfortable with the weight that I am when I wasn’t training. But now that I’m training, I know that this is my body offering me as much as I possibly can.
I guess my advice would be to try to see your body as a friend, rather than as someone who’s against you.
BU: Having come through the eating disorder and the associated body image challenges, do you think that’s altered your approach to photography and the way you capture others’ bodies? Body confidence photoshoots can be a really great way of celebrating our bodies and proving that the body image issues we’ve endured won’t necessarily define us; and being able to celebrate our bodies on our own terms, no matter how they look and no matter what society thinks of them, can prove to be an incredibly empowering experience. Is there an air of this in your own photoshoots too?
Violet: Yes, for sure – and definitely in the people that I work with as well. When I saw the things sexualising women in shoots, for example [which we discussed in part one of our conversation], that also applies to the image that women usually are represented in, which is normally skinny. I’m not trying to curate an image here that pleases someone else, and I think that is always at the forefront of what I do creatively.
I’m always trying to work with a diverse range of people as well. I will purposely go out of my way to find different people, because this is also an exploration of both creativity and a human exploration of others. So I think I would be quite a hypocrite if I just worked with a certain type of person.
But I definitely think my experiences have allowed me to not only be kinder to myself, but to others as well. I won’t put standards on others if I don’t have them for myself. That would be genuinely ridiculous! I think that the work that I do is always is from that standpoint.
BU: What are your thoughts on the body positivity movement in general? There are so many influencers out there on social media, and various different initiatives seeking to help people feel more confident within their own skin. Do you think the movement is ultimately a force for good and something that’s helping others, or is it perhaps progressing a little too slowly in your view?
Violet: In an ideal world, everyone would be okay with how other people and yourself look. But I think it would be a very harsh judgement to say that the body positivity movement isn’t moving fast enough, because that’s not our fault. It would be putting too much pressure on the people who aren’t aware of this issue, and not enough on others who are also responsible for these matters.
BU: A lot of people we interview are very much on the same page with regards to body image issues and the need for change – but sometimes our online space can feel like a little bit of a bubble, and something that’s not always reflected in the mainstream media and in the films and TV shows we consume. So although there’s a lot of movement at a grass roots level, the media still seems to depict slim and stereotypically ‘beautiful’ people – and achieving change at this more mainstream level still feels like a frustratingly slow process at times.
Violet: I think again, in the same way that perhaps we think of the feminist movement, unfortunately it is the people in power, especially in media, that curate images. For example, my friend – one of the people that I’m working with – is doing a master’s degree in Fashion Photography. And they will usually present their projects or their progress, and then will talk about photoshoots and present them to the class. I cannot tell you the amount of times they have come to me saying, “Violet, they told me that my model wasn’t skinny enough, or that she wasn’t pretty enough, or that it’s not what a model should look like.” I cannot believe that this is the conversation that we are having today.
And it’s quite frustrating from the perspective of someone who is quite aware of these things. Perhaps because I know I’ve been very privileged in the education that I’ve had, and perhaps because I’m an avid reader and I love learning, I’ll go out of my way to learn new things. But again, like you said, we conform to the ideas that have been presented to us, because this is the norm. So as soon as there’s a ripple in that, people are like, “Oh my god, how dare you put someone in front of me in a picture that is not size extra small.” And I’ll think, “What? Have you not seen that the majority of the population does not look like that?”
How have we twisted the idea of what we think people should look like so much that in the things we consume – in media, for example – being like, “Actually, she’s not pretty enough”, or, “She’s too ugly.” Or, “He’s not fit enough or masculine enough, and therefore cannot be featured in this.” And it’s like, “Hello? Do you not see how this is a problem?”
Perhaps it also goes into self reflection and the fact that people are so used to the ways that they think, that they don’t think about how they think? And I think this also applies with the body positivity movement too, and perhaps not being aware of it.
In that sense, we just conform to the things that are presented to us. Mass media is not going to present you with a different narrative, and this is the same with photography, film and novels etc. The reasons that things have been curated the way they have is because, ‘This is the narrative and the standards that everyone has, and therefore we’re going to follow this line, and this is what capitalism is about, and don’t you dare deviate because that’s not what we want. These are the standards that we have. This is who we want you to be.’
So you need to have a level of awareness of what’s going on around you. But I also don’t think it’s people’s fault. For example, the people that say, “I had no clue this was going on” – everyone’s experiences are different and not necessarily do I think that it is their fault for not knowing something when they have not been presented with anything else.
So perhaps it’s more about blaming the people at the top that are making this happen, and not giving us any other information. Obviously, as soon as you gain a little bit more independence, as adults, you can start to see things differently because you’re exposed to more things. Especially so with children, who will be presented with images of what females should look like even though they are entirely distorted from reality.
I would also perhaps say that there is a certain responsibility as a parent or as an adult. I have four siblings, and I always feel super responsible in the sense of teaching them something whenever I see them. Or in the way that I present myself, with body image for example. I know that there will be comments about my sister, or my sister’s weight. I was never as angry as when they said those comments to me – whether I ate too much or whatever – but as soon as my 14-15 year old sister was getting these comments, I swear you have not seen me so angry.
Don’t you dare put those backwards ideas onto children that are so vulnerable. It is your responsibility. These kids don’t really know what’s going on, and honestly, a lot of it could have been changed. For example, I know that my own experiences could have been changed if the environment around me were different. So there is a certain responsibility with adults to share that information in whatever way you can. Whether it’s, “Oh my god, I love that you’re eating”, or, “You look good today”, or making comments that are showing them different things.
- Violet Lambies is a photographer and videographer currently based in Barcelona. To see more of the artist's work, be sure to follow @violetalambies.mp4 on Instagram.
As referenced in part one of our interview, Violet is also on the lookout for people to work with for the artist's ongoing 'Vulnerability in Nudity' series, so if you'd look to find out more about how to be involved, feel free to get in touch by sending a DM on Instagram.
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