An interview taken from our new digital issue! “BIGGER” is a new photo book project and the third book soon to be released by portrait photographer Joseph Wolfgang Ohlert. Many men feel insecure and lack self-confidence because they do not see themselves represented in the media. However, as we become accustomed to images of diverse bodies, we can all feel more liberated.
The book features around 80 portraits and various personal texts by five writers, spanning approximately 200 pages. Joseph Wolfgang Ohlert is a freelance artist, portrait photographer, and gallery owner in Berlin. After his high school graduation, he worked at various theatres in Munich as a director’s and stage designer’s assistant before finally moving to Berlin, where he began studying photography at the prestigious Ostkreuzschule and successfully graduated in 2015. He made his debut with the project “Gender as a Spectrum”—a photo book with portraits of a wide variety of people who do not fit into the known categories of “man and woman” and move beyond conventional gender norms.
In September 2017, he opened his first own creative space—the P7 Gallery. In the same year, he published his second photo book project “DARLINGS!,” a personal diary of artfully assembled collages, drawings, and photographic works from his creative phase.
What inspired you to create the “BIGGER” photo book, and how is it a continuation of your previous work?
Being a bigger-built person has always been a part of my life. Since my teenage years, I have been dealing with body issues and suffering under the pressure of beauty standards, mostly the pressure that I put on myself. It’s absurd how delusional our self-perception can be, especially while growing up but even at that point where you should know better as an adult, that everybody is a beach body and happiness doesn’t come from looks. But self-acceptance is not a destination you reach and then have a guarantee; it has to be earned every day anew, a constant challenge which we can complete some days very well and some days not so good.
We just go with it, and try our best. One way of doing so was for me to work on this new photobook. The lack of bigger-built bodies in the (social) media is enormous. All my books come deep from my inner desire to express myself, “Gender as a Spectrum” helped me to understand the topic of gender in general and also my way of dealing with who I am. “Darlings!” is a photo collage diary of some of my Berlin years and “BIGGER” seems to me just like a natural development of working on myself and seeing the beauty in moments rather than in things or “looks.”
Can you share some insights on how you selected the 80 portraits for the book?
It was a journey of two years. Looking for big guys wasn’t as easy as I thought. A lot of guys were fine showing themselves on dating platforms or social media, but when I approached them, they couldn’t make the move and dare to be photographed professionally.
In times of oversharing and over-sexualizing, many men live with insecurity, telling themselves they deserve to be seen but also giving up a bit of control over how their bodies are shown seems, for many people, impossible. Even so, I worked closely with each model, trying to leave them satisfied with the results and make them feel seen.
How do you hope “BIGGER” will impact men’s perception of their bodies?
I believe just the fact of being confronted with pictures of bigger bodies helps to normalize
a more diverse body image. If we step outside, we see all kinds of people with different bodies, and nearly everyone wishes to have something changed, myself included. But what if we can all accept that loving yourself is the only thing that makes life worth living? There is always a way to improve yourself, but the first step is to understand that you are enough.
In what ways do you think the media’s portrayal of body image is changing?
The constant influence to optimize yourself is the most toxic thing happening in the world right now. There is no perfect life, and we shouldn’t lose the ability to fail, because it backfires. Balance is the key.
Read the full interview here:
Interview by Marcel Schlutt
Follow J.W. Ohlert via
@jwo_studio and @josephwolfgangohlert
