I’m female, not a trans person, but there is something I can relate to. “There is something about female-to-male transition that I can relate to in a way. “My work has always been about gender,” she continued. “I had a subject named Joe who came to me about a year later for pictures and he started talking to me about his transitioning from female to male, so I started documenting him.” “I did a series of portraits of androgynous males and females,” she said. On the phone in October, Melamed explained that the inspiration for her portraits of trans men, titled Works in Progress, came from another project she’d done, Two is One.
They pay attention to the aliveness of the word transition - the photos’ subjects are captured in all stages of the process, and the images vibrate with a painful energy. Taken at the homes of her subjects, Melamed’s photos are domestic and warm, subtle and empathetic, while focusing a lens on surgery scars, facial hair, and trans men with their partners. Melody Melamed’s portraits of trans-masculine people share both a bracing and quiet awareness of the struggles and triumphs of the transition process.
