I have loved photography for as long as I can remember. Being entranced by the camera my family always brought along to our holidays, my curiosity never wavered.  This created the dream of one day having a DSLR camera, that way I could finally start taking the images I always wanted to take! Years passed in which I did research on cameras, but never dared to buy one. Until a friend of mine forced me into a camera store, told me to point at the camera I wanted for so long, and made me put down my card. And that’s when it all really started!

With more and more people daring to show up in front of my lens, I noticed that confidence was a repeating topic that was discussed. Combining this with my own history of eating disorders, I decided to try to make a difference in people's lives with my photography. I want to show people that no matter where you are in your life, you are worthy of being celebrated. We see so many distorted images in all forms of media around us, as well as toxic societal standards, that we can lose track of what a normal body looks like. Punishing ourselves in so many ways, to achieve this unrealistic standard. Nowadays I like to say that I follow ‘’the story of women*’’. From boudoir to maternity, to birth and newborn. In each stage of life, you go through waves of insecurities. But if you’re able to always reconnect with yourself, to not lose out on who you are, then you have the most important relationship in life sorted: the one with yourself. And if I can help people to find themselves, even just for a little bit, with my photography, then my mission has succeeded.

*I believe that gender is a spectrum, Marieke Captures is inclusive of plurality of femme voices including trans, queer and non-binary people.