Advocacy
The ‘Wokeness’ of Female Disney Characters
Many Disney characters considered ‘woke’ this century are women or girls. In ...
On special assignment, a photographer goes out—in her neighbourhood of Bang Sue, of all places—to scout fresh faces for our anniversary issue
[This photo essay was first published in the 4th issue of Koktail Magazine.]
Introduction by Mika Apichatsakol; Photos and narrative by Dogherine.
Thai-American photographer Catherine Costa, who goes by the alias Dogherine, has a particular eye for capturing everyday people. I know this because I’ve collaborated with her before, on a project that involved a number of us “regular” models. I admire how her creative projects have a certain simplicity to them that forces us to look closely at a subject and find the complexity within them, and I knew that, if approached with this issue’s topic of “celebration”, Cat would shine a light on the overlooked and the seemingly ordinary, rather than the loud and obvious and cliché. What I didn’t expect, however, was for her to put something together without really leaving her house, or at least her neighbourhood.
The following pages showcase five Thai models even those of you who religiously attended all five days of recent Bangkok International Fashion Week have probably never come across. Enjoy the story told through their portraits by Dogherine and through the photographer’s own narration of how this shoot went down—hiccups and all.
I was initially excited to showcase my photography in a magazine but didn’t want to use work I had previously created. So, with the prompt of “celebration” and a little nudge to do something about Thailand, I meditated on what that meant for me. The most apparent answer was “people”. I’ve had success with photobooths in the past at gallery openings, events, house parties, etc. I decided to recreate that environment on the bottom floor of my home studio and invite people in my neighbourhood of Bang Sue to model for me.
The first shoot was actually a disaster. My mother had been in town, so I thought of hiring her to help with communication and assistance as she’s a lot more extroverted than I am. However, we ended up arguing for most of the morning and by the afternoon, once I had finished setting up my backdrop and lights, I could feel that I was just ready to get the shoot over with.
All five of my models that my mom had recruited came at the same time and, without making any kind of connection with them, I simply took their portrait, asked them to write down their contact information, and paid them a couple of hundred baht each before sending them on their way. While this could have arguably been presented as a celebration of people just as they are, being in front of the camera doesn’t always mean smiling or “looking cute”. It just felt inauthentic to the kind of portrait photography that I take, and it did not do my subjects justice for how they could be portrayed.
I spoke with my neighbour across the street, Muay, who sells drinks and candies out of the bottom floor of her home, about doing another shoot and if she could help me find just women to model. I decided I would pay them a little bit more, take a little bit more time per model, and hire a stylist to join. Luckily, my friend, stylist and graphic designer Kasaya Katia Nacharoen, was available and interested in the project.
We encounter women like this every day. They’re making som tum for you, selling you snacks, or just watching you walk past the front of their home. These everyday women are transformed in front of the camera, and I hope you can enjoy and appreciate that, despite them not being the typical model or “dara”. I hope that you find it refreshing to see some new faces in a magazine.
