Imperfection and Authenticity with Rachel Larsen Weaver

Portraying and valuing everyday family life 

As a film photographer Rachel Larsen Weaver captures authentic and imperfect moments, particularly highlighting the nuances of motherhood and family life. Her work showcases the real and raw aspects of these experiences, steering away from the facade of perfection often portrayed in mainstream media and on social platforms.

In this episode Rachel talks about her journey from being academically focused to embracing her creative side amidst the chaos of raising a family.

Rachel's creative pursuits began as a personal necessity, a way to connect with her life and tell her story through the lens of a camera, which she found more manageable than writing in the noisy environment of a growing family. She has since developed a unique approach to photography, conducting long-form sessions where she spends 24 hours with her subjects, capturing the essence of their everyday lives.

In addition to photography, Rachel has rekindled her love for writing, particularly through her weekly newsletter, which has become an integral part of her creative expression and business marketing. She also hosts a writing workshop, emphasizing the accessibility of writing as a creative practice that can fit into the corners of one's life.

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Researched, edited and produced by Claire Waite Brown

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My effort was on trying to figure out how to be a grown-up and pay our bills and have this child. And even though I had always liked writing, it's really hard to write in noise and in chaos. It was really a way of tapping into my creative self, but being able to do it in a way that didn't seem to fight the life I had. The fun for me is figuring out how do I create a space of vulnerability and acceptance and self-love and embodiment and ease and presence? How can I bring those things to the experience so that we can make the work that looks more similar to the work that I create for myself? When you hire me, I want it to feel like you have an artsy best friend who is finding you in your most beautiful moments, in your most true moments, but that if somebody was watching it, they would just think Hi, I'm Claire, founder of Creativity Found, a community for creative learners and educators, connecting adults who want to find a creative outlet with the artists and crafters who can help them do so with workshops, courses, online events and kits. For this podcast, I chat with people who have found or re-found their creativity as adults. We'll explore their childhood experiences of the arts, discuss how they came to the artistic practices they now love, and consider the barriers they may have experienced between the two. We'll also explore what it is that people value and gain from their newfound artistic pursuits, and how their creative lives enrich their practical, necessary, everyday lives. This time I'm chatting with Rachel Larson-Weaver about film photography, imperfection and authenticity. Hi, Rachel. How are you? I'm great. Thanks, Claire. How are you? I'm very good. Thank you. Please start by telling the listeners what you like to The two most obvious ones, I would say, are writing and film photography. I write a weekly newsletter that's a huge part of my writing practice, and I really enjoy it. And I'm a traveling film photographer, so I go around the U.S. making pictures with families. But you know, there's always those other like little things, right? Like the art of making your home and creating meals and gatherings. Those feel like a huge part of who I am, but maybe not Yeah, no, I completely understand. What was your experience of creativity like as a child at home and in Although I always loved art classes and I loved creativity, I think I identified more as being kind of an academic kid. I loved school so that felt more where I was at home and I didn't feel talented particularly at art because I think maybe when we're little or actually, I think this probably goes through with adults, that we have this idea, like, if we can't do figure drawing, we are not artistic, we are not creative. And so I would have identified more as an academic school kid. And then kind of on the other side, I also really had a desire to be like a helper, somebody who was doing something kind of for the world. So in a way, it took a long time to to label myself more as an artist or a creative, though writing has been a love of mine for a long time. But again, I don't know if I saw that as so much of a creative act as more of an academic act. Yeah, there's often that very straight differentiation that you're either academic or you're arty, and there are lots of overlaps and interlaying of those things. So you enjoyed writing. Is that then what you did educationally-wise after My undergraduate degree was in English and then I started my MFA in creative writing. And for eight years, I taught public high school as an English teacher. So writing was definitely, you know, my first area Yeah. You told me previously that you So I graduated from my undergraduate degree, which was in English, and I was pretty young when I graduated as well because I was a homeschooled kid and I had started university early and I graduated university early. And so I had a job lined up in Thailand and I was getting my travel vaccines. at the health department when the nurse came in and asked me, when was your last period? And I sort of knew what that question meant, though I did not expect that I was pregnant. So I sort of burst into tears. Anyhow, so I did not go to Thailand nearly 20 years ago. And instead, I had my daughter, Asenath, who is quite creative herself. And she's actually at the same college where I went, but she's working primarily Yeah. Oh, brilliant. You have children of all ages. When your family was growing, how did your life look with regards to childcare and I started my MFA in creative writing when I was pregnant with my oldest. It was a low residency program and I had her in the middle of the program and then the next time I like brought her up to Vermont where the school was and my mom came with me and I'd be nursing her between sessions and that got really hot. really fast because it was also waiting tables. I put the writing sort of to the side. My effort was on trying to figure out how to be a grown-up and pay our bills and have this child. And even though I had always liked writing, it's really hard to write in noise and in chaos. And so One of the reasons I sort of turned to photography is it felt like it could do a similar thing. It could allow me to have some presence and notice what was going on in my day to tell the story of myself, even if just to myself. But I could do it more easily in the noise than I could write, especially because the writing I was always most interested in was creative nonfiction and personal essay. So there's a lot of overlap between that and the kind of photography I'm most interested in. And so it was really a way of tapping into my creative self, but being able to do it in a way that didn't seem to fight the life I had. I didn't want to feel resentful of my children or the life I had created. I wanted to find a way to be able to To have that sense of satisfaction that comes with creating, with honoring that part of ourselves that I think longs for more often, and then to find a way that it worked that So were you taking photos within the family? So you're doing it within the life, so you're still able to live the life and record it and feel creative through that as well? Absolutely. It was after my third child was born, Arlo, who's 10 now, that I started a blog. And really, I bought the camera originally because I wanted a place to write and I figured, well, If you're going to have a blog, you have to have pictures. But it was interesting in doing that, I became more and more interested in the visual side of it than the writing side of it. And so for a while, there was a really strong shift that it was photography and writing was a little bit on the back burner, though I would say in the last probably since kind of the pandemic, where I feel like that was another time where then I could only make pictures in my home and with my kids. So I feel like that kind of brought back out the desire to write again, because like, I don't want to be frustrated with the life in front of me. So it's like, how do I find my creativity in a time where I can't be interacting with other people in the same way that So you've done a bit of a up and down and an in and out of between writing photography and why one's important and when another one becomes more important. That's really interesting. Within your writing and within your photography, you're showing perhaps a different side of life than we might see maybe in mainstream media. Can you talk more about what you like to photograph, why you One of the things I'm really interested in is I feel like this depiction of motherhood and family that we see in mainstream media that we see all over Instagram. And there's this level of like facade and perfection. And so then we all kind of rebel against it. And we feel like motherhood isn't ripe ground for art and for investigation because it's just so sentimental. But then the other side can be then if we do see motherhood and family represented in art, represented in literature, it feels so dark sometimes. And so and so to try to find that middle ground, to be like, how do we find a way to show the nuance of this experience, but also that the joy can be as real as the struggle and the both of those things can coexist? And how can we show that in a way that feels honest and interesting and exploratory and like that you're opening up questions rather than just trying to answer everything succinctly. That's been the place that I'm really interested Do you think this goes back to what you mentioned briefly earlier about I feel like when I started these creative practices, a lot of it was really just kind of self-centered. I needed it for myself and to feel connected to my life and to feel like an interesting whole human when your world can get so consumed. I have five kids. They're from ages 18 to four. You know what I mean? I've been deep in the thick of this for a long time. And the creativity originally was, like I said, pretty self-centered. What has been fascinating to me, especially as a person who maybe didn't see the potential for art to be a place of healing and connection and a way of helping to connect other people to themselves and to their days and to the lives that they're building, that when we share the things that are so deep and so resonant in us, it can have this impact that's That's probably more profound than if I had just gone into a helping profession to martyr myself and to be like, I'm doing good now. Watch me do good versus doing the thing that felt pure and true and deep inside of me. I think it's had an important effect on the people that I photograph and the people who see those images and feel more seen and understood in Yeah. Speaking of the other people, you were able to leave a day job after having your fourth child and became a fully fledged photographer. How did you move from photographing for One of the things that I think is really important about sharing our work is that when we start to share it, we kind of don't know what can happen from there. And I think so often we're afraid of doing that. And so we limit the possibilities of what can become. Because I was sharing my work through a blog, people who were close to me started asking if I would make pictures with them or if I would photograph their really small wedding or, you know what I mean? It was things in that world. And it was interesting to me when I first started doing it, how difficult it was, because when I had been photographing my own family, I could kind of wait for the moment to show up. You know, the light comes through and you see the kids staring wistfully out the window and you're like, I'm going to get that picture. It's a very different situation when you show up with cameras and people are like, what do we do now? And so that has been a part of sort of The fun for me is figuring out how do I create a space of vulnerability and acceptance and self-love and embodiment and ease and presence? How can I bring those things to the experience so that we can make the work that looks more similar to the work that I create for myself? All of that has made, I think, for for beautiful imagery, but also it makes for this experience between us that between me and the people that I photograph that I feel like is, you know, maybe even the bigger piece Yeah. So do you think, I mean, What do you think the people who hire you are expecting from a session or what do you think they want the results to be? Why do they hire you I think that's a great question in part because I travel a lot for these sessions and they're not inexpensive and so people are making a big effort to have me specifically come to them and oftentimes they're on payment plans for over a year so that they can make this happen when they have decided to do these long-form sessions. They're all in. And I think in part that it can be really lonely to be feeling like you're doing all of this work within your home and for your family and it's not being seen and it's not being honored in the way you want. Then you want somebody to come in and recognize. what's happening and to acknowledge that. And I think that it's like showing people, reminding them of who they are and what they're doing and giving them something tangible to look back on when you're having those days that you're like, what is all of this for? To be like, oh, you know what? I hired Rachel. She came in and saw the beauty in this. She saw where the light was. Now I have this book of photos to remind me of what it felt like, and I think it becomes a little easier to sink back into some of the gratitude. Yeah. Oh yeah, I just threw that out like it. So kind of my signature session are long form sessions and I go and I stay with people for a full 24 hours. I spend the night with them, we eat meals together and they typically kind of plan a day that is their like perfect day, the way they like to be with their family. Though it's not always with families. I have done it with individuals too, that it's like, what, what is my life and how do I want to show the ins and outs of it? And it also gives this time for like fun and creativity because we have a long period of time. We can set down the cameras and be talking and then get excited about an idea we have and then we go try to enact it and it feels like this deeply connective way It's very different and I can understand how it can create a different scene because you're not restricted by time as you are or by location. If you're going into a studio that makes you a whole different person. You're like in a studio with someone I don't know with a short time and with an aim to create something. So much pressure, isn't it? And I don't feel You know, I think some people get nervous about the idea of like 24 hours. I don't want to be on for 24 hours. And it's like, yeah, you can't be. That's impossible. So usually you get a little way into it and you just are starting to let your, you know, the walls down. And I think sometimes people are worried because they're thinking, How will my partner feel about this? How will my teenage kid feel about this? How will the toddler handle all of this time? But I actually think, like I said, it takes off the pressure. If the toddler is freaking out and having a moment, then we just wait it out. Like they get a snack and a nap and then we try again where it doesn't feel like we have 45 minutes of good light. Like, let's go. I, um, I really like the idea of operating with a spaciousness around time. I always get to airports so early because I don't like to feel rushed. I never have pulled an all-nighter in all of my academic career. I always wanted to do things kind of slowly and deliberately and feel like that I got rid of the anxiety that can come when time is bearing down on you. Over time, this idea developed and I realized because it was how I was creating with my friends or with my family, not just my immediate family, but like I'm one of six kids and so lots of my work is of my sisters and my nieces and nephews. That's how I was getting the best work with all of these people. And I wanted to find a way to offer it so that I could create Also, it feels sometimes, though, like a scam. And here's why. I go to people's houses and they pay me good money to do it. And then they, like, make me their best foods. They show me their most beautiful places. I've had these experiences that I'm like, how did I figure this out? I'm a genius. This is so enriching. And then I come back from having seen how they're interacting with their kids, with themselves, with the day, with the light. And I feel like I've gotten really good at pulling the best bits and being like, oh, I'm taking that back home. I'm Yeah. You shoot with film rather than digitally. Have you specifically chosen that method for a reason? And how does that actually affect the When I first started with photography, when I started my blog and when I was first starting to get hired, it was digital. And then, I don't know, though, it's been a lot of years that I've converted over to film. I realized, well, first off, I hate editing photos. And when you're shooting digitally, you have this huge amount of material and you have to go through this process of like culling and I don't know, it's just like you're making decisions all the time. And I sort of hate making decisions. Maybe that's because I'm a Libra. I don't know. So I like shooting with film because I have so many fewer options and I also kind of think I can't edit out imperfections in the same way with digital. your inclination is to be like, which one is the very best, the most flattering, the least. But I feel like in film, you you take that possibility away from yourself and that there's something that reveals itself that becomes more interesting to me than whatever perfect is or some concept of perfect. So that's part of it. I don't like editing. And I think film has like a certain sensibility to it that it already has so much life to it that you don't have to try to edit it in the same way you do with digital images to kind of give them something. I mean, I still edit my film, but it's just a much, you know, kind of fixing horizons or it's not to the same level. And it also allows me to be a lot more present, though I would argue there are digital photographers that they feel like they're more present because they're just clicking everything. And then it's when they're culling that they feel like they have to get that analytical mind going. For me, I like being able to put my camera down and to be talking and then to just pull it up and snap when the moment comes versus having it glued to my eye. I want it to feel like we're hanging out. When you hire me, I want it to feel like you have an artsy best friend who is finding you in your most beautiful moments, in your most true moments, but that if somebody was watching it, they would just think it was two friends hanging out and that this was not a photo session. That's sort of my goal, because I think also it makes for Yeah. I like the imperfect thing because it just fits with the whole ethos that we've been talking about. So we've been talking a lot now about photography but we started They all get mixed and mingled and you know. Yeah. So As I said, I feel like kind of during the pandemic, I started to put more of an effort into writing. And so a couple of years ago, I launched a weekly newsletter, and I wasn't quite sure at the time if people even read newsletters. I wasn't reading any of them. I mostly felt like it was just junk mail. So it was kind of the coaxing of a friend of mine that I started it. And it has been so huge for my creative life and also for my business and marketing. The newsletter has done really well. It has like a fantastic open rate. When I'm speaking at conferences, sometimes people come up to me to say like, I love your newsletter. And because it is primarily my writing practice where, yeah, I do sell things at the end. I try to tell you, you know, what classes I'm offering, what mentorship opportunities, where I'm doing sessions, all of those things come in every week. But because I'm really trying to make sure that there's this value beforehand, I think people when I show up to take their pictures, they already know me. So they're not as afraid of letting their guards down because they have a pretty strong sense of who I am. And so I think that writing and being opened every Monday evening on their computers, that they've already kind of invited me into their homes and into their lives. And so it has been huge and sort of because of the success of it. Every year I now do a one-month writing workshop where people come together and work on personal essays. And it's not specifically for newsletter writing, but I think that there's a lot of creative people that they understand the importance of writing in their marketing and all of these other places, but they don't want it to feel like learning to write copy, learning to write captions. How can we make art that we use in creative ways, rather than feeling like we're just creating content all the time. And so that's sort of the foundation of that. And so it becomes fun. It's in my like slower season for photography. And it goes back to, as I said, I taught English for eight years. I, you know, it's a Yeah. And you're getting together with other people and sharing that with other people and helping Yeah, and it's I mean, it's just a beautiful thing and the things that people share and it's a. One of the things I really like about writing is it feels so accessible. It doesn't take a lot of equipment. Nobody's going to ask you like, well, what did you write that on? And like, you know, nobody cares. And it can fit into the corners of your life, which is especially, I think, a useful practice for people with full-time jobs, people who are doing lots of care for their older parents or their younger children. You know, You don't have to take out a ton of supplies and have room in your house to incorporate this practice into your life. So I love that aspect about it. I love that it can pull us into noticing and to paying attention. And I think that that can have just such a profound effect on our well-being. And so it's a great gateway drug to creative Yeah, and it is used as such often, isn't it, to like a bit of a warm-up or to get things moving in the brain and loosen up a bit. Yeah, definitely. So what are your thoughts now on what you might like to be doing in the future, in Ooh, this is when I feel flaky because those can change pretty often. I feel like maybe when you asked a couple months ago, the answers may have changed. There are goals that my ego kind of likes, like, oh, I would like to have a published book or I would like to have a mana, a book of my my images out there. I you know, both of those things feel. exciting and possible. One of the things I think a lot of family photographers or wedding photographers, they can kind of worry about aging out of the careers. It feels like you kind of photograph people in your own peer group. And I sort of reject that notion, but also it makes me excited, like, I'm excited about photographing women beyond early motherhood. I'm excited about making images of women when they start to feel sort of invisible and like they're stopping noticed. One of the foundational pieces to my work is I work really hard on loving and accepting myself so that when I can come into sessions, people are seeing it modeled. It feels like a possibility to be like, oh, if she loves herself and her wildly imperfect body, maybe I'm allowed to, too. Like, let's give this a shot. And so I'm excited to how that could look for future work, too. That's I completely understand. Personally, I've had photos, studio shoots done when the children were little. I've had a few headshots done for worky things and then I wouldn't think that I'm 52 and I wouldn't think to hire a photographer unless there was a reason, if you know what I mean, rather than And I think that's really interesting. I mean, I remember being young and hearing my mom, I mean, she still talks about it, my mom talking about like, oh, you kind of become invisible. And I don't like that idea at all. I want. I want the Crones to have their place. And I'm very excited about entering that phase of my life. And I think that when we feel that there is invisibility, one of our jobs as artists and creators is to shine a light on those things. If we think that they're important, How do we create the work we wish existed? It's part of why I really leaned into self-portraits. I'm a larger-bodied woman and I realized that women in larger bodies weren't hiring me to take their pictures. So I was like, well, I guess I'm gonna have to go first. I'm gonna have to show that like fat women deserve to be in the picture. I want that to continue in in other phases of life and in other spheres and places to say, no, there's not this one moment where we were all our most beautiful at 17 years old and everything else is this like shallow or this like, yeah, just let's try to get back there and Screw that. Yeah, that's true, isn't it? It's always the looking back. Oh, I used to be like this. I And we look back at those pictures and we're like, I wish I had appreciated how beautiful I was then. That's one thing. I know that there's a lot of photographers that they talk about the heirloom quality or the legacy quality or your kids are going to be so grateful to have these pictures of you in the future. I think that's all beautiful. But it isn't my motivation. My motivation is for you to see you right now and to love her and to accept her and for this moment to be impacted by having allowed yourself to be seen. That feels like the heart of the work. Yeah. That's perfect. That's really lovely. Thanks so much, Rachel. I've really, really enjoyed this chat. How Like most of us, I can be found on Instagram. It's rachel.larsen.weaver. And through there, in particular, my weekly newsletter, here and now. You can find that on my website, which is RachelLarsonWeaver.com or Instagram. But my newsletter is my favorite way to communicate. So you'll be in the loop for all of the writing, photography, self-love, Thanks so much for listening to Creativity Found. I hope you enjoyed this episode and gained some value from it. If you did, perhaps you'd like to contribute a small monetary sign of appreciation, either by becoming a regular supporter from as little as $3 per month using the link in the show notes, or if you're listening on a value-for-value enabled app such as Fountain, Truefans or Podverse, feel free to send a few sats my way. I also occasionally promote products that I personally use, so please use the affiliate link where relevant if you are buying from those fine companies. Thanks so much, I really appreciate it.