Hi,
I’m Kiara (she/her)
Thank you for being here
Photo by Jaeda
Instagram.com/jades.eye.view
A bit about me
I am a sensitive, joyful, loving, passionate Forest creature who sees magic in the tiniest details.
I have always felt intimately connected with the Natural World, feeling most alive when scampering around Wild places. With an innate soft spot for the creatures most scrutinized, I’ve been playing with spiders since I first learned to walk. My love for Nature is fundamental to who I am, bringing meaning to my existence.
I have a biology degree from the University of Washington, and a scientific article about lizards on google scholar! I had long planned for a career in science, and have a few seasons of field work under my belt. I have found, however, that engaging with Nature through these sessions fulfills all aspects of my being, allowing me to be the deeply feeling creature I am.
When I’m not working, you can find me trying new restaurants with my partner, hanging out with my family and friends, or using my microscope to admire the tiny critters that live among the moss. I also enjoy writing as an outlet for my big feelings.
I am so grateful to spend my time focusing on the beauty of the Natural World. The work that I do here is my love letter to Mother Nature and to humanity.
My journey with photography
I’ve always been drawn to the beauty of preserving ephemeral moments in photos, but it wasn’t until 2018 that I got my first camera. I had been wanting a camera to capture the wildlife in the Peruvian Amazon, where I would spend the next summer interning for the non-profit, Hoja Nueva.
It had been a lifelong dream to visit the Amazon jungle and experience the limitless biodiversity. When this dream became a reality, the experience was far more profound than I could’ve ever imagined. I spent that month photographing all of the wildlife I could find, and fell in love with being behind the camera. The jungle left me viscerally aware of the infinite beauty of the Natural World, and forever changed for the better.
About a year after getting my camera, a friend asked me to take portraits of them for their birthday, and I immediately fell in love with capturing people. I began shooting as much as I could, photographing my closest friends and aspiring models.
After a few years of experimenting with different styles of portraiture, it was the Forest sessions that stuck with me most. I was able to combine my love for the Natural World and my love for capturing humans, which evolved into My Mossy Heart.
Why this work is so important to me
I have had a tumultuous journey learning to love and accept the body I exist in. Like most of us, I grew up bombarded by messages about how my body was “supposed” to look. I watched the women in my life pick themselves apart, trying to force their bodies to take up less space, failing to see the beauty in their uniqueness. This issue is not exclusive to womanhood. People of all genders fall victim to the white colonial, ableist, fatphobic, misogynist, transphobic, lies about what is beautiful.
A few years ago, I became so fed up with rejecting myself, with spending emotional energy wanting to become different. I allowed myself to get really angry, thinking about how unfair it was that I’d spent a lifetime wanting to change myself, that I had never gotten to experience comfort in my body. I thought about how much joy I’d been robbed of, how all that wasted energy could have gone to something meaningful. I realized the absurdity and pointlessness of hating myself. I used the anger as a catalyst to change my relationship with myself. My work is far from over, but I truly believe that I am worthy of self-love, and so are you.
My belief that everyone deserves to feel at home in their body inspires this work. I hope that my clients walk away from our time together feeling closer to themselves, more comfortable in their skin. Everyone deserves to be celebrated and captured. We are Nature, and as with the rest of Nature, our beauty takes on a myriad of different forms.
