Maybe love stories were written about our friends.

Throughout the entirety of my life, through trials and tribulations, one thing has remained predominantly the strongest: my female friendships. Romantic love comes and goes. It never stays too long. But female friendships can last forever and are a constant reminder of love and support. 

There is also something special about the female connection; the way we hold space for each other is just different. Female friendship is divine. We care for each other in a tender and gentle way that is unlike any other type of relationship in the world. This divine femininity is present in all aspects of female friendship, but where I find it the most prominent is in the little moments. Whether it be through combing each other’s hair or painting nails, these small acts of femininity represent the core of all female friendships. In an effort to capture the delicate intimacy of female friendship, I created this series of photos as a love letter to all of the women in my life.  

Bio: Lauren Vincent is a third year honors student at the University of Colorado Boulder. She is pursuing a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography along with a double minor in Media Production and Art History. Lauren has published work in two exhibitions, La La and Untitled, both in Boulder, Colorado. Additionally, she was selected by the University of Colorado Art Board of Directors along with a small handful of students to continue her fine art practice at a higher level and earn a BFA degree. Lauren is 20 years old and grew up in Louisburg, Kansas, a rural small town 30 minutes south of Kansas City with a population of 4,000 people. Photography has been her passion since getting her first camera in middle school. From then on, her life has been a whirlwind of ingenuity and self-expression. In late middle school and early highschool she started out doing commercial freelance photography, such as weddings and senior portraits, but has since shifted into creating conceptual fine art photography series.

Artist Statement: I am in a constant state of motion sickness. The human experience is constantly changing and its uniqueness varies from person to person. This change and consistent movement of life is something that has been hard for me to stomach. I have found little to no ways in my mind to grasp this thought and process changing yet impactful events in time and my life. But, there is one method that has helped me find peace of mind within the world; Photography. Photography does something our minds cannot. Photography captures change and makes time completely static. Photography shapes my perspective of the world and allows me to tell my stories of the vast human experience and how it has impacted my life. I use portraiture and meticulously created sets to capture my journey with the movement of life, and to express my emotions derived from societal issues such as sexism and the male gaze, and personal events such as mental health crises, eating disorders, and my experience as a woman in the world. I use both mediums of digital photography and analog photography.