While in graduate school for counseling psychology at UW-Madison, Kyira Hauer grappled with disordered eating rooted in childhood trauma. Also an artist who has found healing through creative expression, she set out to create a photography series examining beauty ideals and body image featuring real people from throughout Wisconsin. She pitched the idea to the Overture Center for exhibition in one of its galleries, but the project didn’t make the cut.
“After getting the rejection, it still felt really important to me,” Hauer tells Isthmus. She continued to solicit photographs with the intention of creating a large mixed-media work. The project’s reach soon extended beyond Wisconsin. She started getting photos from all over the country along with stories — sometimes three or four pages of text — about people’s struggles with body image. The response inspired Hauser to shift gears and turn the project into a documentary that combines the powerful mages along with interview-based storytelling.
Hauer’s film, #ReclaimBeauty, will premier May 15 at The Marquee in Union South. The screening starts at 7:30 and will be followed by a panel discussion featuring the documentary’s creators and its subjects.
“The whole premise is the idea that beauty is this concept that we reserve for a very select few people. It’s something that we strive for physically, but there’s also the idea that beauty is what’s on the inside,” Hauer says. “It provides these two polarizing ideas, when in reality it’s both. People deserve to feel beautiful on both ends of the spectrum.”
Through the filmmaking process, Hauer noticed that all the subjects had something in common — issues with negative self-image and awareness of society’s unrealistic beauty ideals began in childhood. “Everybody had a story,” Hauer says. That realization prompted her to expand the project’s mission, creating with help from other therapists a manual to go along with the film. Aimed at middle and high school students, the curriculum focuses on self esteem and body image. “The guide will have information on how to lead hard conversations and ways for teachers and peers to create a more inclusive environment,” Hauer says.
After the May 15 screening, Hauer hopes to get community-wide feedback on the project and use that insight to fine-tune the manual. She plans to test-launch the curriculum during the 2018-19 school year, offering the film and the curriculum free of charge. She’s also recruiting people to serve as “courageous conversationalists” who can undergo training to speak in schools or lead workshops along with film screenings. The effort is initially focused on Wisconsin, but Hauer hopes to expand the project’s reach throughout the country.
“We need change, especially during critical [youth] development periods, in schools and at home,” Hauer says. “Leading these conversations in schools and having these trainings goes along with a much bigger project of revamping schools and the way they approach helping students.”
