Grandes Mujeres: Photographs By Bay Messina

Grandes Mujeres

PHOTOGRAPHER'S PROJECT

Grandes Mujeres—the title of Argentinean photographer Gaby Messina’s project translates literally as “grand women.” But really, her subjects are far more than that. English-speakers have to borrow from the French when describing such women. They are without question grandes dames (and also femmes d’un certain âge): women of vital presence and palpable grandeur, who have reached the point in life when that grandeur truly comes into its own. The fact that there are no proper cognates in our language for these terms might indicate there are no cognates for the women themselves. That, of course, is thankfully not the case. Grandes dames are here among us—but in a culture of perpetual hunger for youth, we are inundated with and distracted by another, showier brand of beauty. A young woman, Messina trains her focus on these aging women, and provides a prompt for those of us who may have been looking the other way: these are women whose dignity and panache are the products of long lives, experienced with deepest grace. They are well worth looking at.©