In 2017, Brazilian photographer Marcos Alberti, shared the The O Project to break down the barriers of ‘female sexual well-being’.
And in order to do that, he created a four-part photo series taking on what’s often a taboo: women masturbating.
Alberti photographed over 20 women from a mix of liberal and conservative countries around the globe, snapping them before, during and after self-pleasure.
With the photos taken from the waist up, they used a personal massager below the frame as they reached their moment of climax.
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By taking these tasteful yet stigma-challenging snaps, the photographer wanted to show that women should be in control of their own sexuality as well as being empowered by doing so.
Although, Alberti did say there were some challenges in getting subjects to agree to the art project.
He told Indy100 that 2,000 women had signed up for the project but the ‘more we explain, less women are available’.
“At the end we got 22 amazing women from different backgrounds,” the photographer said.
The O Project came after Alberti’s famous 2016 piece, 3 Glasses Later which saw the changing mood and facial expressions of his subjects after a few glasses of wine.
And he was inspired to take this further.
“I really love to capture real expressions of people, so after the wine project, I wanted to go a step forward, and capture more intimacy expression,” the photographer explained.
“Expression that has never been capture with this naturality before, not what you see in television and internet. Real expression.”
He also explained that by approaching the somewhat taboo topic through ‘humour’, people began to ‘open up and share opinions more freely’.
“Which can lead to a monumental change in people’s mentality,” he added. “I love that we were able to speak so frankly with these women about sex and pleasure.”
Alberti also spoke further with Refinery29 about the importance of The O Project.
“On television, actresses are usually trying to look good all the time for the camera in an unrealistic way and when we look to internet, porn in particular it’s very fake,” he explained.
“The sexual positions, expressions, the bodies with a lot of make-up… this is unreal.
“Women feel pressured to achieve what they see on these channels and they’re looking for something that doesn’t exist.”
And in discussion with Little Things, he described it as ‘the first project to document the female orgasm without approaching it from a sexual or erotic perspective’.
How were the photos taken?
Alberti praised the 'enormous courage' of the women who took part, explaining: "It was very important for me to get to know them, to spend some time with them, to make them comfortable to trust me as a photographer."
Each of the women involved used personal massagers, with Alberti taking photos before they began, during their peak and after they'd finished, with the release of endorphins that comes from an orgasm clear in their smiling, glowing faces.
Alberti's shots are 'fun and sexy, but tasteful'. Including from him, everything below the waist was hidden from view.
A behind-the-scenes video showed that his camera was pointed through a small hole cut through a curtain, hiding most of the women's bodies. And for extra protection, each of them sat behind a tablecloth, which obscured everything below the waist.
Topics: Art, Sex and Relationships
Jess Battison